


The Philosopher's Omens

by SwordSoup



Series: Wizard's omens [1]
Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett, Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: (Kind of? They just don't want to deal with it.), Alternate Universe - Harry Potter Setting, Alternate Universe - Professors, Angst, Aziraphale was his "friend", Book 1: Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, Child Abuse, Crowley Was Raphael Before Falling (Good Omens), Crowley and Aziraphale kind of steal Harry, Crowley is Good With Kids (Good Omens), Denial of Feelings, Diagon Alley, Fluff, Harry Potter Gets a Hug, Informal adoption, JK Rowling is wack and I'm going to make this Not Her Original Story At All, Love Confessions, Magic, Quidditch, Soft Aziraphale (Good Omens), quite a few actually
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-30
Updated: 2020-06-20
Packaged: 2021-02-27 14:42:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 47,234
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22458943
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SwordSoup/pseuds/SwordSoup
Summary: Crowley and Aziraphale are having a fine time after the Failed Apocalypse -- getting drunk, having fun, going on park walks, not dealing with their feelings -- when Hogwarts calls on them to be professors.On the way there, they end up stealing a child. Together.(Or, Crowley and Aziraphale are hired as professors at Hogwarts and decide to save Harry Potter, taking him in as their own on the way. No one could guess that eventually, an apocalypse of human origin would arrive.)
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Series: Wizard's omens [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1616059
Comments: 119
Kudos: 769





	1. The Boy, The Angel, and The Demon who lived.

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! 
> 
> Greetings, and welcome to my first Harry Potter fic. (Also, my first crossover fic.) 
> 
> This first chapter is already a huge one, I know, but I promise the next ones will be shorter and easier to digest. (Much shorter.) This one is only long to allow all of the information and building to fit in. In the beginning notes of each of these chapters, I will be including trigger warnings. I don't know exactly what to tag for triggers, so please read the notes if you're worried!
> 
> Without further wait: Here is The Philosopher's Omens!
> 
> (TW: Child abuse, physical abuse, nongraphic injury)

Aziraphale watches as rain sloughs down the bookshop windows. He’s quite content to wait for Crowley within the leather-parchment embrace of his bookshop, hands cupped around a mug of tea and a smile gracing his lips. For the past week, it has been raining. Precipitating on, and on, and on, spacing itself out with hour-long breaks to give the waterlogged city a few hours to breathe. 

Anyways- he doesn’t mind the rain. (It makes for a wonderful reading atmosphere.) The only issue arrives with the fact that his walks with Crowley have become much more frequent since the Apocolypse, and the mud beneath his shoes is a  _ bugger  _ to miracle away. Still, he stays with it. Anyone within a twenty-foot radius of Crowley would have to be aware of his love for rain. 

Aziraphale often wondered if The Almighty had put him in charge of that very first rain, 6000 years ago, and before he’d fallen. His fondness for the stuff was a bit dramatic, when it wasn’t ruining his shoes. 

And now, as if summoned by the mere thought of his dramatics, a large black Bentley goes careening down the street, its driver a bit more reckless than usual with the rain aiding to his speed. It’s almost as if Aziraphale can  _ hear  _ him cackling.

“Speak of the demon,” mutters the Angel, directing it to no one in particular, setting down his tea, walking to the front door, and pulling it open before Crowley can faceplant against it. Only an instant later, a swaggering, sultry Demon wrenches himself up and out of his car. He ends up practically launching himself towards the shop, and his legs twist in a dizzying ballet of broken steps. 

“An _ gel!” _ Crowley throws his arms wide open, eyes bursting with the effort of his grin. He saunters about and hugs Aziraphale with the fervent excitement of a man who’s not seen their friend in over a millennium. Aziraphale finally recognizes the pink tint of his cheeks and stifles a laugh. The half-drunk bottle of wine they’d been supposed to share doesn’t go unnoticed either. “How are you?”

Aziraphale pulls back -- much to Crowley’s dismay -- and just shakes his head in mock-disappointment, pointing toward the bottle. Crowley notices, and laughs, and takes another drink. The Demons of hell often mused that Lucifer could beat  _ anyone  _ in a liquor drinking contest. Crowley, who can hold far more alcohol than an ordinary human, is not Lucifer.

“Dear boy, that was meant to be  _ shared,”  _ Aziraphale chastises disapprovingly, with a pointed glance at the bottle still gripped in Crowley’s hands. He does not pout. Not in the slightest, because Angels shouldn’t really pout or dance or frolic or hate the sound of music and enjoy  _ blasphemy. _ “Miracles can’t help everything!”

“Miraclesss?” Crowley laughs -- a small, hissing thing, matching the snake’s slur of his words -- and throws himself against the couch nearby. “Miracles, Angel, can do a bloody  _ lot!”  _ He takes another swig before having his lifeline yanked unceremoniously from his hands. There’s a moment of irritated grumbling and grabby hands, before a cup full of red is placed back between his fingers. Aziraphale pours a glass of his own and sits, a hand fluttering nervously to Crowley’s knee, which bounces like anything. 

Crowley drinks from his new glass like it’s the first cup of wine to be made. He still has one arm raised, as if looking for a high-five, and he seems to realize right as the wine starts to tip out of his glass. He quickly replaces his position with a new one -- his previously unoccupied arm slung gently over Aziraphale’s shoulders. “Y’ find ‘sss not hard to make a-“ the wine glass refills. He shivers, not getting any soberer. “Few  _ miracles.” _

“I know, love,” Aziraphale says, sipping wine of his own and settling into the cozy warmth of Crowley’s embrace. And like this, they drift, settling into each other in a rhythm they haven’t only kept for the day. They speak when necessary, facing the fireplace and settling.

The silence is a comfortable one. It’s the type one lapses into when in the presence of someone they trust with much more than something so trivial as their life -- and Aziraphale and Crowley both trusted each other with a great deal more their corporations. Until, of course, it’s broken.

A tiny tinkling of a bell inserts itself between the quiet. Aziraphale frowns at its bold amusement. “I’d locked that,” he says to himself, before sliding away from Crowley's grip with a reassuring smile and a promise to be back. “I’ll just check up on that.”

“Alright, Angel,” Crowley says softly. He trails a finger over the stained edge of his cup and thinks.

The Angel walks to the front of the store with a confused -- and secretly bit annoyed -- look to his cherubic face. He pulls open the door with a huff and expects to tell some teenager to go find a librarian to torture. His expression, as the person comes into view, changes.

Now -- Aziraphale has had his fair share of weird entrances. The mob, mafia, crime syndicate and cops had all failed to enter without his permission, but their brief visits were always amusing to deal with nonetheless. His customers tended to enjoy entering an  _ unlocked  _ door and then eventually leaving, bookless, through the  _ same  _ door and with either a disposable cup of tea or a slew of  _ curses  _ at their lips. Sometimes, he’d have people looking to fight with him, verbally or physically. Sometimes, he’d have tourists. On one, very drunk occasion, he’d had a Demon dressed in drag. But, usually, the people coming through his door are simply  _ customers. _

The person at the door is  _ not  _ a customer.

They are a tall, bulking person, a mass that takes up Aziraphale’s entire doorway and fiddles with what seems to be a bright pink crocheted scarf around their neck. A great brown fluff of hair sits against their head and flies about in a jerking pool of curls when he twists to meet Aziraphale. They find themself having to look down upon the Angel, but a huge smile bursts onto their face regardless.

“‘Ello!” Their smile broadens as they announce themselves, and they wave.

“Er- hello?” Aziraphale’s waves back, but with a far smaller amount of happiness to his gesturing. He promptly begins to wring his gloved hands. “What’s… your name?”

“Rubeus Hagrid, at yer service. Keeper of keys and grounds at Hogwarts school for Witchcraft and Wizardry.”

Aziraphale blinks again.

Rubeus blinks back, though he might not have realized he’d done it. Blinks like this were very important, but it seems Hagrid was not fully aware of how much might’ve been communicated.

“H- Hogwarts?” Aziraphale raises an eyebrow. He’s not intimidated, but he’s bloody confused at the very least, and it has him wanting to step back, and away, and delve deep into his books in the hope that he can recover all of his memory of the school. The name rings a bell in an instant: some long forgotten, repressed, and ignored memory. For now: lies. “I- I know of wizards and such, but… which school is-“

“A-“ Crowley appears from behind and heaves a hiccup. He throws an arm around Aziraphale’s shoulder, shuddering as alcohol leaves his system and refills his bottle. “Ngk- a...” He pauses to tuck his now-corked bottle under his armpit and put up air quotes. “A ‘Hogwarts,’ is the biggest bloody wizarding school out there, Angel. ‘S in Scotland. I always did like Scotland...” 

“I’m surprised y’ haven’t heard of it.” Rubeus looks put off at the revelation, but he stays quiet in his confusion. Aziraphale begins to feel a little guilty at his own deflection. Still, the man clears his throat and continues happily. “But yes, Hogwarts! Dumbledore ‘imself has-“

“Dumbledore?” It’s Crowley’s turn to be (act?) confused. He raises an eyebrow and mouths the name again as if it was a wad of half-chewed gum stuck to his teeth. “Dumbledore.”

“The-” Rubeus pauses and raises a bushy eyebrow. At the realization that they really don’t know who that man is, he reels back. “You don’t know _Dumbledore?_ Dumbledore, as in the most powerful Wizar’ alive?” His eyebrows seem to crawl right off of his head -- which really, it wasn’t _that_ odd for a wizard, their eyebrows were rather wishy-washy -- “How d’you not know _Albus Dumbledore?”_

“I’m so sorry about our confusion.” Aziraphale gestures behind him to his backroom, now finding itself populated with chairs and a sofa, and Crowley untangles himself from over his shoulder. “Will you come and sit down, please?”

Rubeus nods -- there’s a hint of uncertainty to him now -- and follows behind the two. His watchful gaze is not lost on the other two inhabitants of the room, who promptly attempt to make themselves look as professional as possible when they’re both half-drunk. 

Still, Rubeus settles on Aziraphale’s couch when prompted too and without complaint, only wincing a little when it sinks under his weight. The two others sit themselves down into matching armchairs across from the furniture. Crowley, staring at Rubeus, starts to get a feeling that the giant man is  _ intimidated,  _ as he twists at the base of his scarf.

“Er- anyways-“ He clears his throat. “Albus sent me, an’ he wanted me t’ ask if you had any interest in becomin’ professors at ‘Hogwarts.” The scarf is beginning to come undone. Crowley continues to glower unconsciously. Aziraphale puts a hand on his shoulder and the man’s aura recedes, if only a bit. “I assumed ye’d both know who he was since y’ stopped the apocalypse an’ all.” 

They  _ all  _ blink.

“Wh- how the bloody hell do you know about that?” Crowley leans forward, legs pitching into the table with a rather painful sounding crack. He hisses —  _ really  _ hisses -- like a snake. “That’s supposed to be- erg-“ He cuts off as Aziraphale’s hand lands again on his knee.

“I may‘no be a genius,” Rubeus grumbles, “But I know a thing er’ two. I know about you two’s work. The  _ Wizarding world  _ knows, Mr. Crowley, and Mr. Fell.” Noticing what has now become an upper hand, the man smiles at them.

“We don’ mean anything hostile by all of this. Dumbledore only wan’ed to offer, y’know?” Rubeus shakes his umbrella, checking for water, and accepts a cup of tea from Aziraphale. He takes a drink, then blinks in sudden surprise, realizing the china had been summoned up without even a spell. “How did y-”

“We’ll do it,” Crowley says, abruptly, staring at Aziraphale with an open expression. His fingers drift lazily over the edges of his sunglasses - solidly back in place now. The other hand, unoccupied, runs carefully through his short-cropped hair. Aziraphale stares back -- then breaks the spell of silence by glancing away and shooting Rubeus an almost-apologetic look. 

“Y- Y’ don’t even know what positions yet, though! Yer gonna have to hear m’ out first.” Rubeus pulls out one, no -- two -- notecards from a jacket pocket. Upon closer look, and them being handed to him, Aziraphale realizes that they’re freshly sealed letters instead. His address is as plain as anything on the front of it, and a quick glance to Crowley’s letter shows him the same. A bright red wax seal rubs against Aziraphale’s fingers as he presses them into the paper curiously. Rubeus addresses Aziraphale first. 

“Mr. Zira Fell. Albus Dumbledore formally proposes that y’join Hogwarts’ staff as our official librarian.”

And- before Aziraphale can say anything, uncross his legs and stand and shake the man’s hand, perhaps, smile, anything- Rubeus turns to meet Crowley’s unendingly hard gaze.

“Mr. Anthony J. Crowley. Albus Dumbledore formally proposes that y’join Hogwarts’ staff as our official Herbologist.”

And- well. Neither of them much dislike the offer, and Rubeus had been quite polite. There isn’t much else to say. 

\---

“Well, he was certainly… someone.” Crowley sniffs and downs the final dredges of his wine. “Y’think he was a…”

“A giant?” Aziraphale nods, a brief smile crossing his face.“Half, perhaps. I’d thought they’d all been killed..” He averts his eyes from the Heavens as he mutters something about  _ Gabriel  _ and  _ xenophobia.  _ “But really, I think we should address the elephant in the room.”

“Elephant?” Crowley frowns, tipping his glass back to look for something that’s not there, and groaning when he realizes his wine is al in his throat, not in his cup. “Was it an elephant in that one?”

“Yes, dear.” Aziraphale waves a dismissive hand and sets his empty wineglass against a coaster on the table. “The elephant, being that  _ we  _ are not  _ wizards,  _ love. We may not be muggles, but we can’t start going around and saying-”

“Oh, ‘ello there, we’re just... “ Crowley gesticulates randomly with his empty hand. “A bloody Demon- an- an’ an Angel. How can we help you?” Another drink, and a small smile, and a villainous bow. The crinkles around his mouth are enough to have Aziraphale grinning as well. “Want a- a-  _ a duck  _ or something?” 

“Crowley,” Aziraphale pleads through a laugh, “You aren’t helping!”

“Fine, fine, but if I’m sober, you’re- you’re sober too! No coherence- in- in drunkenness, Angel.” 

Then -- for the third time that night -- his wine bottle is refilled, and he begins to look a rather nasty shade of pale green. With the absence of a drunken stupor, Crowley is left to sit and simmer in his discomfort, letting out a breathy  _ “Shit.” _ He saunters once to the left, then to the right, then right down onto the loveseat. Aziraphale doesn’t miss the coaster he miracles in the way of the wood first. He almost calls Crowley out on it, then decides he’s content to just smile a few feet away. “Your turn, angel.”

Aziraphale squints as he feels a rush of liquor and heavy drunkenness drift out of his system, leaving him a similarly sickening shade of “No thank you, that seems a bit more than I’d ordered.” His grimace drops, and only returns when he realizes its starting to grow rather cold in the room. He almost changes the temperature, till he feels his shoulders being stolen away by a massive hug from Crowley. Well — it’s not much of a hug — truly, because Crowley doesn’t really  _ hug.  _ He lounges behind Aziraphale with his arms over the angle’s shoulders. Aziraphale can’t find it in him to complain, and he takes Crowley’s long-nailed fingers in his hands, facing the wall and thinking. 

“Dear, we probably should go find out where in this world we become wizards, shouldn’t we?” Aziraphale, with a bit of a sigh, concedes to the idea that he’ll be collecting another human label. 

“Nfk. it can wait.”

And to that - the Angel can’t really disagree.

\---

Rubeus -- He’d told Aziraphale and Crowley both that first names were fine -- had left them a day ago and with a sealed envelope each. They both had their address printed in perfect cursive script. It had a long, descriptive list for both of them, detailing instructions on how to arrive, (by train) where they would live, (in a town nearby, or their own homes, if they were willing to “apparate” off of school grounds) what they needed, (lots) and prospective lesson plans. 

They make their way to a shabby and almost entirely hidden tavern by the name of “The Leaky Cauldron” on some foreign side street, as if it was intentionally shoved out of the way. It’s damp, and swirls with dusty darkness, smelling a little of mold, yet neither of them smell any occult or ethereal beings besides themselves. A man at the counter smiles at them as he rubs at an already clean glass, and so the two cross over. 

“Hello.” He sets the glass down and nods to both of them as they slide into barstools. “Can I get you anything?”

“A scotch.” 

“Nothing, please.”

He gestures his assent at Crowley, then at Aziraphale, and slides a cup across the table after a moment of pouring it. Crowley lets it swirl and flash about his cup before he downs it in one fell swoop, finding it pleasantly warm and delicious.

All in a hurry, the room begins to grow cramped, and louder. Crowley has seen many bars in all of his existence, and he’s surprised to find one like this so suddenly packed with people. When he swivels around he hears hushed gasps, outright exclamations, and many new people drawing near to the center and abandoning drinks and tables. In the center stands a dark black head of hair, thrown upwards and just above a bespectacled face. They’ve got a confused, slightly scared expression under their broken glasses, and their eyes seem to catch the floor and walls more than anything. Rubeus stands not far away, and both Crowley and Aziraphale stand in surprise. The man waves to them and smiles with enough kindness to kill a man. Or, more aptly, raise the dead.

“Harry Potter,” he mouths. In a sudden instance, Azirapphale sucks in a sharp breath, eyes widening. Crowley looks over in concern.

“Angel?” 

“I-“ Azirpahale’s voice shakes with something like awe, and Crowley sets his hand in the angel’s shoulder, some irrational worry rising in his throat. “It was Lily and James Potter. That’s his child.” Aziraphale smiles, bittersweet. “I was their  _ friend.” _

“You-“ Crowley frowns. “His parents?” He asks, pointing to the child stumbling about in the middle of the crowd.

“I was one of their friends. They were killed — their son lived.” He walks forward and brushes Crowley’s arm off. The demon follows, still a little surprised. Aziraphale always was the one who made too many friends, Crowley reasons. The crowd has begun to be pushed away with Rubeus’s help, leaving a green-eyed, underdressed, short child with a curious face. He had light brown skin that seemed to stretch too tightly over his bones, and he was tall for his age. He also has a bright scar in the form of a lightning bolt splitting his forehead and cutting through his brow.

“Harry  _ Potter.”  _ He walks up to the boy once everyone else has begun to leave. “Do you remember me?”

“I-“ Harry frowns, still looking shaken. His curls bounce over his eyes and he shoves them upwards with a hand. “I don’t think so. I don’t remember much of anyone. I’ve only just figured out I’m a  _ wizard.” _

“His “family” didn’t tell him anything,” Rubeus spits from behind the boy as if “family” was a curse more than anything. Crowley and Aziraphale can relate much more than the man knows. Heaven and Hell were not hospitable. “Harry Potter, meet Mr. Fell and Mr. Crowley — soon t’ be the librarian and herbologist of ‘Ogwarts!”

“I’m sorry I don’t remember you, Mr. Fell.” Harry pauses, then taps a finger to his side anxiously. “Professor. Sorry.”

“My dear boy, it is  _ perfectly  _ alright.”Aziraphale sighs, a little shaken. Crowley stands back and continues to watch the proceedings. There’s something… off, about the boy. He’s not quite sure what, and he searches through the hatred he can find in the air, tugging on a line near the boy's form and searching

_ Pulsing hate stuck deep under the scar, and bright green light, and there’s so much anger- _

He hisses and grips his forehead. Whatever it was, it doesn’t like being disturbed. It’s not the boy, either. It’s something within him, but Crowley has never met a single child with the capabilities to hate that much.

“Dear?” Aziraphale twists around and frowns, eyebrows drawing together in worry while Crowley drops his hand and the boy watches with those eerily inquisitive eyes. “Are you alright?”

“Fine, fine, angel. I’m fine. Just a-“ he breathes a deep breath. “Headache.” Aziraphale nods

“Did you know em?” Rubeus asks, quieted some.

“I knew them well. I met them…” Aziraphale shakes his head. “It doesn’t matter.  _ That’s  _ why Hogwarts sounded familiar to me.” 

“You knew my parents?” Harry wonders, looking up to Aziraphale with a strangely anxious expression. He seems afraid to ask the question. 

“Yes. They were… some of my closest friends. They were  _ wonderful,  _ and dear Sirius and I did look for you when they d-“

“Sirius?”

“Your godfather, dear.” Aziraphale makes to continue before he realizes that Rubeus is going a very odd shade of white. “Is something the matter?”

“Sirius?” Rubeus stutters on his words and starts to looks like he’s going to stumble into hell as fast as Crowley can say  _ wahoo.  _ “I- we need to get goin’”

Crowley points to the backdoor. “Why don’t we come on with?”

\---

Overall, Crowley finds his opinion of this Dumbledore fellow has already taken a massive hit.

His perception of Rubeus and Harry? They’ve only grown even better. 

Harry is quiet. He’s quiet, and he’s smart, and he clearly hasn’t had a good childhood. He flinches away from Rubeus’s large armed movements, he’s timid when asking questions, and he seems to shrink under Aziraphale’s overbearing fondness. Crowley walks next to the boy and stays, for the most part, silent. 

The streets are bright and packed full with all matter of people and beats. A pet store displays bats and hooting owls. A store with a firey red broomstick displayed in its window has children pressed to the glass. Plants, animals, wares, books, everything is strewn about in a messy array of life. After Harry and Rubeus visit an imposing building called “Gringgotts” populated with busy house-elves weighing and doling out money, they start at a massive shop -- dark, as many of the ones on the lane were -- and draped with the telltale signs of a seamstress. A woman bustles towards them with her arms draped lavishly in silken robes, confirming Crowley’s suspicions. 

Hagrid walks off once Harry is settled. He asks what Crowley and Aziraphale like with ice cream, but they politely decline his offer. That leaves the two to watch as the boy indoors is fitted for long black robes. 

“Well.” Crowley has the sudden urge to laugh, as the angel and demon are left alone in awkward silence and he’s suddenly reminded of the Garden. “That went down like something kind of like a-”

“Don’t,” Aziraphale warns, looking away to stare inside. “You feel it too, don’t you?”

Crowley nods. No further explanation is required. Aziraphale doesn’t have to be able to sense hate to know that something very wrong has gone on in the child’s life.

“Well,” Crowley begins, starting to feel a little uncomfortable. He can deal with “awkward.” He’s good at that. He can’t deal with  _ silent  _ awkwardness, especially around Aziraphale, who really did adore chatting when he wasn’t enamored with a book. Aziraphale shifts in the sun. “Should we go in? Get some robes of our own?”

Aziraphale nods, and so they walk in together, speaking to the woman -- Madam Malkin -- for a moment, till she leads them over to a waiting area. After owning their corporations for thousands of years, both Aziraphale and Crowley had gotten their measurements down perfectly, which she seemed to appreciate if her bright eyes and giddy smile were any indications. Aziraphale and Crowley start to chat, as people -- even Demons and Angels -- often did when there wasn’t much to talk about. Crowley watches Harry out of the corner of his eyes, half-listening to Aziraphale, and half-listening to an oily little blond boy with an upturned nose. 

"I say, look at that man!" The blonde tilts his head toward the front window, where Hagrid has just stepped back into view. He’s grinning happily, holding two ice cream cones to show that he was currently unable to come in.

"That's Hagrid," Harry replies. Aziraphale has begun to listen as well. "He works at Hogwarts. "

"Oh, I've heard of him. He's a sort of servant, isn't he?"

Crowley has started to find that he’s found another child he doesn’t like. He did really enjoy children, even if he’d not admit it in 6000 years. This one, he was finding, was one of the ones he didn’t enjoy. Harry -- on the other hand -- already had the potential to be like Warlock or Adam to Crowley.

"He's the gamekeeper," Harry says, disdain just as obvious in his voice as it is on his face.

"Yes, exactly. I heard he's a sort of savage -- lives in a hut on the school grounds and every now and then he gets drunk, tries to do magic, and ends up setting fire to his bed. "

"I think he's brilliant.”

It’s the first time Crowley’s heard the boy speak unkindly to anyone. He’s starting to feel proud.

"Do you?" Blonde sneers. "Why is he with you? Where are your parents?"

"They're dead," Harry replies shortly, and both Aziraphale and Crowleys seemed to simultaneously find this as their cue to intervene.

“Hello, Harry.” Crowley sniffs and finishes walking towards the two. “Almost finished?”

The robes miraculously find themselves almost finished.

“I.” Harry looks around at his robes and nods. “I think so?”

“Who’re they?” Blondie sneers. It seems to be his default expression. Crowley sneers harder. “ _ Muggles?” _

“No.” Harry tilts his head. “What’s wrong with muggles?”

“Well, they shouldn’t really be allowed around here should they?” The boy looks at the mirror before him, and Crowley realizes with an agonizingly silent sigh that  _ damn it, this kid’s family fucking sucks as much as Harry’s. In different ways of course, but fuck.  _ He decides smiting him sounds like a bad idea no matter how irritating he seems. That doesn’t mean he can’t be rightfully pissed. “Them  _ or  _ half-bloods.”

“You’re all done, dearies.” Madam Malkin returns with Crowley and Aziraphale’s robes, which they won’t end up wearing much anyway, and ends any further conversation. They all take their fresh clothes and walk from the shop in silence.

Harry eats his ice cream with a thoughtful face and talks about Quidditch with Rubeus. Crowley files away the fact that he probably will need to use a broomstick if he wants to fly amongst these wizards. It’s for the best, really. He didn’t like using them much.

_ Blood, and angry shouts. He presses his hands to someone’s golden stained side. There’s a war on. _

He shakes the memory from his mind and continues walking, only finally chiming in when they begin to discuss Voldemort.

“Say his name,” he grumbles at the name you-know-who, shoving his hand into his pockets. “Say it, ‘cause otherwise you’re just giving him more power. Don’t let ‘im scare you, Harry.” He looks away. “All men are fleeting. Even wizards.”

\---

They split paths when Rubeus takes Harry to a luncheon down the road, right after the boy’s wand has finished exploding golden light within a twisted and mazelike shop that smells like shoe polish and pine trees. Crowley and Aziraphale enter the wand shop just as the other two walk out. It’s small, but an endless amount of corridors flow from the front desk. Wands and wand boxes are scattered about, creating a comfortable mess. Their footsteps resound around the room as they tap forward on the checkerboard tiles, falling still at the edge of the room. They meet a man with catlike green eyes that shine as if he’d just sold someone a noose and he’s beginning to regret it. Crowley bristles at the look.

“You must be it, then.” 

He says it with all the finality of a man walking to their grave. Or -- in Crowley and Aziraphale’s perspectives -- a tornado of hellfire and a bathtub of holy water respectively. 

Aziraphale chuckles nervously. “I’m sorry, have we met?”

Ollivander shakes his head and turns away from them. “No, but I know who you are. You’re not wizards-” He disturbs the piles of wand boxes on the counter to pull two, completely identical cases free. “But you’re not muggles either.”

He looks at Aziraphale. Licks his lips, dodges his gaze, then looks away with a tripped smile. “Cedar, with a Phoenix core.” He pulls a wand from the box on top of his pile. “12 inches. Inflexible.” He hands it to Aziraphale. It’s a light color, and of simple construction, with roughly carved feathers twisting around the base of the wand. The Angel takes it, hesitant. It takes only a moment for the light to begin swarming about the room -- light yellows like an evening sun, old parchment, and a good cup of tea.

Now, he turns to Crowley, looking contemplative. “Hawthorn, with a phoenix core.” He takes from the last box now, hands shaking with age. “14 inches. Inflexible.” This one is handed to Crowley. It’s identical to Aziraphale’s in its carving -- the same rough, half whittled edges -- but the feathers aren’t there. Instead, a snake curls around the edges of the bottom. A dark, ruby light flys from the wand -- winter sunsets, velvet, rippling snake scale. It subsides.

\---

Harry has an owl. Harry has a snowy white owl, with pretty blue eyes and several black flecks in her wings. Harry has an owl, and he seems exceptionally overjoyed by that. Aziraphale almost pulls his wings out at the same time. He takes pride in seeing his creations. It even hoots at him a few times, and he nods in agreeance at its excited words.

(Raphael had always been the builder. He’d taught Aziraphale once, a silly rebellion. Aziraphale had only completed one project. He’d been creating one day -- an owl -- the first, with light brown feathers -- when the Falling had begun.)

He shakes the memories away and walks back into the tavern with everyone else.

\---

Platform 2/8’s halves or something. Rubeus had dropped the boy onto a train and left. Harry had started to stare hollowly the moment he lost sight of them all, and so, by some mysterious miracle, Crowley and Aziraphale found themselves on the back of a train, feeling a little guilty for having abandoned him originally. They really were going native and starting to like this child more and more was a part of that.

“Hello again, Harry.” Aziraphale walks to his side and points to the seat across from him. “Can we sit?”

The boy’s great big green eyes light up with confusion but he nods silently. Aziraphale lets Crowley drop into the window seat, and then he slides in beside him.

Crowley snaps his fingers, and the Bentley appears in a parking lot at Harry’s stop without a driver. The train hums, bangs with a movement that swallows up their own, wheels driving forward smoothly. Harry pushes his glasses up, as they’d begun to slide down his nose. Crowley notices the tape keeping them together+, and with a curious snap of his fingers, the tape disappears and the two halves fuse together. Crowley thinks nothing of it, then starts cursing himself internally when he remembers he’s supposed to be using his wand. It was a pretty wand, too. 

Harry pulls his glasses off, an awestruck expression on his face. “You…” He looks at Crowley, squinting a little then pressing his glasses back on. “You fixed them.”

It’s not a question, but Crowley nods in confirmation anyways.

“How’d you do it? Without a wand, I mean.”

Noticing Crowley’s panic, Aziraphale begins. “ It’s simple wandless magic.” He plucks his own wand from his pocket. It looks dead, and unlively, in that train car. Useless. “We don’t really need this much.”

“That’s amazing,” he admits, eyes wide. He’d yet to see any magic beyond Hagrid’s umbrella magic -- which wasn’t bad, he still adored Hagrid -- but he’d not even seen regular wand magic and now he’s seen  _ this? _

_ “  _ Er- Harry?” Harry turns back to Aziraphale. “Can I ask  _ why  _ they were broken?” Aziraphale taps his fingers against his wand. “Could your guardians not have gotten you new ones?”

Harry flinches. Crowley frowns, but ignores it, while Aziraphale just smiles encouragingly. Ignoring his worry. 

“My... My cousin, Dudley. He dropped them.”

“Dropped them hard enough for them to snap?”

“He. He uhm- was just playing. And he stepped on them after he dropped them. Then threw them at a wall.”

“He  _ what?’  _ Aziraphale can’t hide his horror, but luckily, Harry doesn’t seem to take it as an attack on himself. “My dear child, why didn’t anyone  _ help  _ you?”

Harry shrugs. “It’s happened plenty of times already. I talked to a snake and got Dudley stuck in a zoo enclosure, and so they didn’t want to fix them.”

“You-” Crowley laughs, this time in sheer disbelief. His voice twists, warping to a hissing, stretched, singular syllable. It slides like water off his tongue and into Harry’s ears, but Aziraphale hasn’t a clue what they’re saying. He can guess -- he watches Crowley’s forked tongue hit his teeth and enunciate the rolling speech. “ _ It’s called parseltongue -- that’s talking to snakes, Harry.” _

_ “You can do it too?”  _ The boy leans to the edge of his seat, suddenly eager to talk.  _ “Can Professor Fell do it?” _

_ “Professor Fell can do a lot of things. He can talk to owls if you’re interested. But nope.”  _ He pops the P the best he can in parseltongue.  _ “None of this.” _

“Owls?” Harry says, in English, attracting Aziraphale’s attention. He looks over to the man excitedly. “Can you talk to  _ her?”  _ He looks lovingly at the snowy white owl watching them in the other seat.

“Of course, I can ask whatever you like when she’s woken.”

Harry smiles.

\---

They walk down the street to one  _ 4 Privet Drive, Little Whinging, Surrey.  _ It’s a tall house, white, and utterly boring. There’s no personal flair beyond a fog of general annoyance shifting like a stormcloud around it. That -- and the fact that it is surrounded by torn trees, bushes, owls feathers, and letters. The Dursley’s car is still being unloaded when Crowley and Aziraphale walk up to them, Harry sandwiched protectively between them. They can both feel the bones of his shoulders digging into their sides. 

“Hello, Mr. Dursley,” Aziraphale says with all of the sweetness of an owl about to dive. “Mrs. Dursley.” He smiles at them, and thanks Shakespeare for acting classes. “Mrs. Dursley. I, am Professor Fell. I will be teaching your nephew this coming year!” He extends a hand to be shaken. It is not shaken. He slides it back under Harry’s parcels, which he had been carrying.

The two are an odd couple. Vernon Dursley is wide, and short, with an unruly mop of sweaty hair so dark it almost matches the red shade of his face. He looks like a pug or a cat whose face had gotten into a fistfight with a wall. Waves of unpleasantness rolled off of him like sweat. He did not use deodorant.

Petunia Dursley was the opposite. She was tall, and her neck craned outwards -- perfect for gossiping and shrewd glares -- and she had a very birdlike face. She looks like she had tried to kiss Vernon with a bird’s beak, and accidentally turned him a plum color. The same unpleasantness as her husband mingled with her own and shuddered, turning into something worse. She looked nothing like Harry.

“An’ ‘m Mr. Crowley. I’ll be teaching him too” Crowley does not extend a hand. In fact, following God’s petty nature, he curls his panted black fingernails further into the ridges of a box he’d been carrying. Mr. Dursley turns a much darker shade of frothing purple. Aziraphale doesn’t even have the slightest urge to correct Crowley’s etiquette. 

“You won’t be teaching him  _ anything,”  _ Mr. Dursley roars, a great, belching noise like that of an ugly frog _.  _ He hurls curses between his words. His fists ball up and clench, unclench, at his sides. “There’s no need to- to teach him _ bloody card tricks!” _

The one-sided shouting match ends with a resounding smack.

Harry had just been  _ too close  _ to the ugly, gigantic fists of Vernon Dursley. They bounced off his face like nothing, and he slammed to the concrete driveway with purple as bright as Dursley’s face blooming on his cheek. His head makes a loud noise as it slams against the ground and flies back up, starting to bleed. He sits on the ground, in shocked silence.

Aziraphale has seen war. He’s seen golden ichor, the blood of Angel’s, staining his hands and others. He has seen humanity’s most dire struggles, grappling through mud and slick as chess pieces in an unmoving game. He has seen children die the most terrible deaths, not saved by anyone, not even an Angel. Not even a Demon. That doesn’t desensitize him n the  _ slightest _ .

Aziraphale, for as much of a pacifist he attempts to be, reaches a hand out from beneath a package and slaps Vernon Dursley firmly across the face. The man reels backward, clutching his now-broken cheekbone, gaping.

Crowley, ever one to dive head first into battle, revisits his healers past, and dives for the child. Harry looks at him with eyes shining with tears -- and, Crowley notes, with a hint of pride, desperate anger -- and watches, as Crowley turns to his uncle, and starts to hiss.

“If you ever touch a child in such a way as that again,” Crowley mutters. His voice is as simple and steady as a rock, but some terror heaves in Vernon’s gut without his permission. “I’ll give you death.”

And, just to prove it, he rips his glasses off and stares right into, and past, the Dursley’s. Yellow and orange burns at them n his unyielding stare, and he smiles.

(Lucifer makes deals. His brother makes  _ promises.) _

\---

“Do you have anything you need inside?”

Crowley whispers, making sure not to aggravate the sure-to-be-a-monster headache Harry is about to have. Harry can’t seem to get his lips to unstick and respond, so he just shakes his head, glasses smashed against the pavement not far away. Aziraphale sits next to Crowley and conceals an inordinate amount of anger. Harry just watches them. “Good. can you walk?”

Harry accepts a hand from Aziraphale and stands, walking next to Aziraphale as the Angel wrings his hands. While Crowley lugs packages four at a time into the car, Harry slumps into the seat, still shocked. 

The Dursley’s have long since disappeared. They’d abandoned their nephew and orchestrated a chorus of horrified screams as they burrowed into their home.

Once the packages have been safely tucked into the trunk of the Bentley, Crowley staggers towards Harry’s seat, crouching down on the packed concrete earth with the balls of his heels and staring.

“Lean forward, would ya?” 

Harry obeys, and Crowley slides a hand onto the back of his head. Aziraphale keeps watch behind them. Crowley’s hand begins to hover above the wound, and Harry shudders against a feeling of pleasantly warm water pouring down his scalp. Crowley pulls away and then cups the boy’s cheek with the same hand, a slender thumb touching the edge of Harry’s nose, and his palm falling gently against the purpling bruise. He shuts his eyes in concentration, then pulls away right as it finishes healing, hissing a little and shaking his hand back and forth.

“I’m sorry.”

It’s the first thing Harry says. He’s afraid to say it -- even though Crowley and Aziraphale were nice, they were still new to him -- and so he finds himself scared of something without even knowing what it is. It frustrates him to no end, so all he can vocalize is that “oh, I _ am  _ sorry.” He doesn’t sound choked, or pained, or like much of anything at all. It’s a sullen, emotionless whisper of an apology.

“Ssstop that.” Crowley squeezes a hand gently onto his shoulder and stands. “Don’t apologissse for shitty people.”

“Language, dear.” Aziraphale turns to Harry before Crowley can be offended. “You haven’t done anything wrong in the slightest. You, in fact, must be stubbornly brave, aren’t you?” He sighs in the tone of an anxious Angel.

“I don’t think I’m very brave at all.”

“Then you’re being foolish,” Crowley states simply, before standing and closing Harry’s door, climbing into his seat and continuing the discussion as Aziraphale gets settled. “You’ve lived with them for years, and you’re still here. You’re brave.”

\---

The bookshop isn’t cold or unwelcoming, per se, but it’s receiving a right lot of shivering new occupants. An exhausted and freshly healed Harry trails in front of Crowley, who is nudging him towards a couch. The two inhuman beings can both see the boy shivering from quite a bit more than cold, and another twinge of irritation and anger twitches through them. It’s a good thing the two were there, because there’s no telling when Harry would have gotten real medical care otherwise. 

Aziraphale locks the doors and glances back to Harry with a sympathetic, worried, gaze, hands twitching to help as Crowley shoves a glass of water into the child’s shaking hands.

“Harry,” Crowley says, softer than Aziraphale has heard from him in a long time. The Nanny Astoreth part of him was usually the one softer with children, but Crowley’s hair remains short and his eyes are uncovered. The demon settles a hand next to Harry on the couch. The boy looks as if he wants to run under Crowley’s strange, snakelike gaze. “Do you want to go back to your… erg…. house?”

The boy glances at Aziraphale. Then, back at Crowley. “I don’t have much of a choice, do I?” He looks almost frightened before he averts his eyes.

“Oh sod that thought off,” Crowley growls, standing again. “We aren’t forcing you to go back  _ there  _ if it discorporates us in the process.” He snorts. “I may be evil incarnate, wahoo, but when you hurt  _ kids  _ or anyone besides who bloody deserves it, you’re not exactly an  _ angel.”  _

“What he means,” Aziraphale continues as he joins Crowley’s side, “Is that we’d rather like it if you stayed here. With us, until you can find a better home or until school if you prefer.” 

Harry ponders this thought for a moment. He’s also pondering the legitimacy of the statement that Crowley is evil incarnate, but he focuses more on panicking at how nice they’re being to him. It’s unfamiliar. Unwelcome -- but only because he’s so incredibly sure he’s going to wake up in a cold sweat on that driveway with his uncle looming over him, Crowley, Hagrid, and Aziraphale all a nice dream.

“With you?” His curious green eyes dart about. His hair flashes into his eyes, and he mourns the loss of his glasses. Through his blurry vision, he finds Aziraphale holding a perfect, no-longer-smashed-to-bits, pair of his glasses. He accepts that with an open, confused stare. “Wh-”

“Best not to question it, dear.” A smile flutters onto Azirahale’s face. “And of course, I have more than enough room in the flat upstairs.

(A new room weaves into construction now, as they speak. Aziraphale concluded he was only  _ half  _ lying.)

Harry is silent for a long time, and the two let him be. He seems to sweat under the pressure, so Aziraphale goes around and prepares him a cup of tea, while Crowley kicks around dust and waits for an answer. The demon looks like he’s itching to let himself relax and sit down, so when Aziraphale walks back over, he sets a placating hand on the demon’s shoulder.

“I…” Harry swallows. “I’ll stay.”

Crowley breathes out a heavy sigh. He collapses, and Harry almost thinks he’d just passed out. His figure seems to fold onto itself, revealing a writhing, gigantic snake -- a mass of jagged ruby red scales and pearlescent eyes the same size as Crowley had just been. He’s huge, but Harry has the feeling that he could be a  _ lot  _ bigger.

Aziraphale lets out a matching breath. Suddenly, great white wings erupt through his back like twin limbs. They twitch as they curl around the room, brushing against bookshelves and then up against Crowley as the snake heaves its body into the sky and stares, unblinking, and right at Harry.

“That-” Harry frowns, then raises his eyebrows, and finally, suddenly, breaks into a grin. “You- what  _ are  _ you?”

“An Angel.”

“And a snake.”

_ “The _ Snake,” correct Aziraphale automatically.

“The- you’re the one from The Garden, aren’t you?” Harry looks at them with brimming excitement, appearing as if he’d like to pet Crowley’s scales. The Snake obliges, slithering near. “My aunt and uncle were sort a’ religious, in the way where they only went to church on Christmas, but I picked it up well enough. You are, aren’t you?”

“Right,” Aziraphale says cheerily. “The Angel, The Serpent, an’ all. We stopped the Apocolypse too, you know?”

\---

Harry, for the first time in his life since his parent’s deaths, has a good end of his summer. 

It’s spent flipping through books, listening to stories from Crowley and Aziraphale, learning proper owl (and snake) care, etc. It’s a wildly confusing and startling summer. The Dursley’s don’t come looking for him, though, and he isn’t surprised in the slightest. What he  _ is  _ surprised about is the number of wizards who try to find him and congratulate him, talk to him, kidnap him, etc. Aziraphale seems more than slightly disgruntled at the new customers he’s begun to receive.

He’s taught of the past, and the present, and the lies planted within it all. He’s taught of Crowley, and of Aziraphale, and of the Fall and of everything else between. He’d loved to learn even when all he could learn was rubbish. Or, barely anything, when he was focusing on not being turned into bloody pulp at school than he was learning. He learns maths and English, and all the other subjects he’d been barely grasping before he moved in with Aziraphale and Crowley. He learns a few new spells and learns them  _ with  _ Aziraphale and Crowley. 

(The two turn out completely incompetent with spells.)

He makes fast friends with Warlock, Adam, Pepper, Brian, and Wensleydale. He meets another witch -- an American one -- and she immediately begins to school him, chastising Aziraphale and Crowley over half of the things they do with their wands. By the end of it all, he’s become absolutely… something.

It’s a strange emotional brew, the one he feels, and one he can’t really seem to be able to put into words. Crowley and Aziraphale have become more of a family than the Dursleys ever would be.

And then, school arrives. 

\---

Aziraphale flys about his room in his flat, shoving his suitcase full of things and having a few near-misses of snapping his wand in half.

“Is everything packed, dear?” He peaks out his door, looking into Crowley’s room. The demon had moved in after Harry. It was simply easier than him going back and forth between homes. The room, and the upstairs flat in general, had begun to look a bit like a makeshift Garden of Eden. 

Crowley lounges on his bed and brushes his knuckles thoughtfully against his suitcase. “All ready, same as the last time you checked.” He goes back to thinking in silence and glaring at a succulent on his windowsill. Aziraphale turns to Harry’s room and smiles.

The boy has taken to squashing all of his belongings into his suitcase with a fervor any eleven-year-old would have. Clothes and bits of everything are strewn all over the floor, and Aziraphale kneels down next to him, showing him how to actually pack while the boy watches silently. After a moment of silence in which Harry contemplates whether asking “Is neatness really important?” he starts gently settling things into his case. It takes him a bit of time but he eventually finds he can shut and lock the case without snapping his wand in half with frustration.

“You pack like Warlock,” Crowley grumbles, walking into the room, suitcase in hand. Aziraphale grabs his own with a nearly imperceptible “oof.” 

They walk out of the room and out of the house in varying degrees of success. Crowley has to yell at a plant, Aziraphale has to lock another window, Harry has to find another sock. 

(If one marks time by the amount of time it takes for an Angel, Demon, and Human together to get out of a door, an hour would be twelve.)

Finally, when the sun is beginning to feel tired of passing time for them, they make their way out to the car. It’s a sunny, unfamiliar afternoon, where rain clouds threaten to push at the horizon but haven’t quite arrived yet. Queen bursts from a disc, covering some conversational Mozart or Tchaikovsky, and Harry can’t help but hum along to the tune of Bohemian Rhapsody. The streets are lousy with cars, but Crowley still speeds so quickly that Aziriphale starts to glare at him.

When they get to the station, it is just as packed as anything, and Harry starts to wonder how they’re going to find a mysterious platform -- or normal one -- at all. They skim around the edges of the crowds, pressed near walls and tucking themselves into empty rooms to avoid the horrible amount of people. Harry sees platform ten just when it seems all hope is lost, and his eyes widen, hands coming up to push his glasses up his head on reflex. 

“Crowley,” he says, hoping to catch his attention over the angry buzz of sound in the area.”I found it.”

“Hgk?” He tips his head down, orange flashing behind his glasses. “Where’s it at, then?”

Harry nods at it, and Aziraphale starts to form a loose path forward, trailing in front of them like he’s leading a pack of ducks. People subconsciously step away, leaving them room. “Well,” Crowley drawls. “Where is it, then? Platform 9 and a quarter, or whatever Rubeus called it.”

Aziraphale responds with surprising patience. “Its platform 9 and 3 quarters, love.” They finish their trip, standing before the two separate platforms. Harry’s cart -- with Hedwig, and his many packages -- looks ridiculously out of place, but so do Aziraphale and Crowley by nature. The crowd doesn’t resume it’s crowding around them. For no reason any of the humans can think of, they drift off.

“Do professors ride the train?” Harry asks, strolling between the two. He’s begun to fill in his own form, and his clothes fit much better. His glasses, too, fit perfectly.

“That’s what Rubeus told us.” Crowley shrugs, and glances between platforms 10, and 9. He looks again. He blinks. “Shit.”

“Language!” Aziraphale steps forward and runs a hand over the wall, looking for any more labels and finding none. Harry, behind them, starts to look a little nervous. “Harry, it  _ was  _ 9 and 3 quarters, correct?”

“Yeah,” he says, and holds his ticket up helplessly. “It- it’s right here.”

Out of the crowd --

"-- packed with Muggles, of course--"

Harry, Crowley, and Aziraphale all swing around at once. The voice came from a plump, motherly looking woman who was talking to four boys, all of whom had bright red-heads of flaming hair. All of the boys had a trunk -- next to a little girl who was staring jealously -- and one of them had an owl.

"Now, what's the platform number?" the children’s mother says.

"Nine and three-quarters!" The little red-headed girl squeezes her mother’s hand and looks up to her with a desperate look. "Mom, can't I go. . . "

"You're not old enough, Ginny, now be quiet. All right, Percy, you go first. "

The eldest -- but still not very old -- boy marches to the between-space beside platforms nine and ten. All three of the unknown spectators watch, unblinking -- which wasn’t very hard for an Angel, snake, or eager and excitable child -- as the boy runs between the air. He seems to split through atoms, flying forward with some childlike determination. 

Just before they can see what happens, though, a great cloud of tourists clouds their vision. Crowley curses vividly enough to make a priest cry.

"Fred, you next," the woman says. She nods at one of the boys identical to the other.

"I'm not Fred, I'm George.” One of them rolls their eyes. "Honestly, woman, you call yourself our mother? Can't you tell I'm George?"

"Sorry, George, dear. "

"Only joking, I am Fred.” The boy winks and a toothy smile appears on his face right before he runs forward, hurried on by his brother’s chants of “Hurry up!” He disappears. Aziraphale is the one to sigh in troubled annoyance this time.

“You would think they would explain this,” Aziraphale says. “Especially for teachers.” 

Now the third brother was half sprinting to the barrier, and he was almost there -- and then, sudden as anything, he collided with the wall and wasn’t there at all.

There was nothing else to do for it.

"Excuse me, "Aziraphale said to the older woman. She turns and smiles at him warmly, the way any mother might smile when they’re happy. “I was only wondering if you could tell us how to get into the platform?”

“Hello, dears.” She smiles even wider as Harry comes walking up. “First year at Hogwarts? Ron-” She gestures to the youngest boy “Is new too.” 

The boy, despite being only Harry’s age, is tall, with big hands and feet, and an unruly mop of red hair. It rivals Harry’s ridiculous mess of hair, minus the jet black shade. Freckles poured across his cheeks like blush. Crowley looks at them -- the woman and the girl with their long, red hair -- and he muses that maybe his long hair should make a return.

“Yes,” Harry tells her. “The thing is, none of us know how to get onto the platform.”

“Oh, not to worry," she says. "All you have to do is walk straight at the barrier. Don't stop and,  _ don't  _ be scared you'll crash into it. That's very important.” She pauses as if done, then reconsiders. “You’d Best do it at a bit of a run if you're nervous. Go on, go now before Ron. "

Harry looks up to his guardians, and they both nod. “We will see you on the other side, Harry,” Aziraphale says, prompting him to go with a brief smile. Crowley waves a hand about and scrunches up his nose.

Harry gulps, fingers whitening against the handlebar of his cart. He starts slow, then speeds up, mouth twisted in worry and anxiety. All of this before -- in a flurry of an angry owl and childlike determination -- he disappears.

She turns to Aziraphale and Crowley. “Are you his fathers?”

Aziraphale -- who hadn’t been born prone to blushing -- but who had grown into the habit, flushed pink. Crowley rolled his eyes under his sunglasses. “Ah- ngk. No, not really.” Crowley shrugs, feigning cool nonchalance while he thinks on her question internally. “We’re not together. Only friends. Harry’s parents ‘ave died, and- and so we er... Took him in.”

“Harry..” Ron runs the name under and around his tongue, and then his eyes light up. “You mean Harry Potter?! The boy who lived?”

“I-”

“Ron, it’s rude to ask things like that,” the woman states, disapproving. 

“It’s quite alright,” Aziraphale assures her, with a patient smile. “Yes, he is Harry Potter. We probably should be joining him.”

Before the younger boy can start growing more excited, his mother smiles and speaks again. “Well, it was nice to meet you…”

“Professor Fell,” Aziraphale says, with a smile. “And-”

“Professor Crowley.” Crowley nods at her.

“The pleasure is all ours, ma’am.” Aziraphale shakes her hand and lets her introduce herself.

“Oh! Molly, Molly Weasley, but you can just call me Molly.” She purses her lips. “Ma’am is to bloody formal.”

“Well, Molly, thank you.” 

No longer hesitant, the two rush through the barrier, looking around for snow-white wings and dark black hair. Shrieks, laughs, chatting, crying. It all floods a nearly identical twin of King’s Cross station -- despite the towering red train upon the tracks. It's high necked figure breaks apart the scene in a perfect split. Children mill about and fill its cars, while parents help them with their luggage or tearfully say goodbye. Aziraphale and Crowley catch Harry pressed against a wall. He's utterly stuck, yet still driving forward, eyes narrowed at an empty compartment not far away. 

Crowley shoves himself through and grabs onto the side of Harry’s cart, ignoring the boy as he looks up at his Godfather in surprise. 

"My turn," he mutters, before a grin spreads across his face. He fully grips the handle, turning it to the side and nearly squashing a few people as he weaves expertly through the crowd. People yelp and dive away from his careening path, but seem unperturbed and unsurprised. In the end and by what should be a miracle, he arrives safely to the car Harry’d been eyeballing, the other two hurrying behind him before their chance to move closes up. 

They stand for a moment, catching their breath. It is all too chaotic in the station. The rest of the area seems to have a cool regard for the small group, now that they've assembled near the train car.

“Alright, Harry.” Aziraphale sighs then begins to lift luggage into the empty cart. Crowley helps as well, in the form of climbing into the carriage and helping Harry to carry his trunk and Hedwig's cage inside. The suitcase lies flat on its side in the corner, and Hedwig hoots appreciatively when Crowley sets her on a seat and unlatches the cage. “I guess, it’s our time to go," the Angel says, soft. "I heard someone saying that the staff car was in the front.”

“Don’t get lost,” Harry tells Aziraphale, and the man smiles appreciatively and almost rolls his eyes. Harry turns to Crowley. “Don’t eat anyone’s pets.”

“Screw off.” Crowley smiles a wicked smile, but the smug fondness in it is so thick anyone could probably reach up and touch it.

“Don’t be rude, either of you.” Aziraphale finishes his incredibly insincere chastising, and holds his arms out to Harry, accepting a small and one-armed hesitant hug from the boy. He pulls away right as Harry does, hands clasped again, eyes ringed with maybe-pride.

“Now, climb on in.”


	2. The Sorting Hat

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Onwards and upwards! This chapter introduces a few new (but technically old) characters, including a couple of students. Also, the sorting!
> 
> (And trust me, Aziraphale and Crowley get a house too.)
> 
> Hopefully, my placements are ones you all agree with!
> 
> I hope you enjoy!

The train ride seems to drag on endlessly. Scenery passes by -- great, swelling trees, deep lakes, islands accompanying the rolling planes. The train doesn’t watch to sightsee. It is dutifull in its mission, and Crowley finds himself leaned back in his seat and half asleep. Aziraphale sits across from him in the teacher’s car, the only other occupant of the area a woman dressed in a vintage dress. She looks at them passively once, then promptly begins to ignore them.

He’s spent his time hoping to fall asleep, but his mind is occupied with much more than silence. It isn’t that he’s anxious for their arrival. Not at all. He’s more intrigued by that — he was 6000 years old, and a magical school with insane wizards and such sounds interesting enough. No, he wasn’t very nervous. He was restless.

One can be restless without knowing why, and that was Crowley. The question-asker, the snake, the serpent, the tempter, the wiley-old-evil-cruel Crowley. He embraced those names when people gifted him them. There wasn’t any use in forcing people to think he was something else. He’d begun to embrace his Falling years ago, even if the thought of it still brought up nausea and regret.

But no — he was only restless. This train ride wasn’t doing much for him. 

“Be back, angel,” he says, lifting himself up by the arms of his seat and cracking his back as he straightens. 

Being cramped in a human body that didn’t quite fit as well as snakeskin could lead to some annoying issues. Mainly, cramping. Sitting in one, languid position for too much time led to his bones feeling like they were locked in place, shoving up against each other and scratching against each other. It was easily fixed if he shifted into a snake, but it was just as easy to realize he couldn’t always shift. Especially now, where he would probably be called an unregistered animagus if he wasn’t careful.

Aziraphale only nods at him, nose and bright blue eyes the only thing visible over the yellowed pages of an ancient book. He streaks past each word faster than the train flies past the scenery.

Crowley makes his way to the bathroom, peaking into the other cars discreetly. Children sit within, sleeping, reading, talking, and some of the older ones practicing spells -- the amount of hexes he sees makes him only a little excited for the year ahead. Finally, the restroom car, a small, cramped room more than anything, drops into view. He slides in and stands at the mirror instead of doing what one is meant to do in restrooms. He grips the edges of the sink and then frowns in annoyance, running a hand through the hair fluffed up atop his head. It’s become too normal. He misses his long hair.

So, with one easy snap, it extends, red waves falling down to curve about his cheeks and drape around his neck. It takes only a moment, and he stops them right at the edge of his collarbones. The red dances in the light streaming from a half-concealed window, and he releases his grip on the counter, satisfied and smiling as well. His tattoo hides behind the hair.

He walks back to the cabin looking almost happier with himself. No one notices him or the change, and he drifts into the room again without disturbance. Aziraphale glances up from his book. He glances back down. Then, his gaze shoots right back up, eyes darting around to stare at the new length. Crowley suppresses a laugh, but Aziraphale chuckles brightly, surprised.

“Nice... Herb uses, my dear," he says as if it’s some inside joke they've spent hours planning, when in reality -- it was some sort of childish mockery. Wizarding magic was hilariously different from Occult and Ethereal magic. Both of them knew they wouldn’t use their wands in private. There was simply no use for it. Their interaction is terribly awkward, but Crowley just grins even harder and lets out a full-bellied laugh, slumping into his seat yet again. 

—-

Eventually, and as to be expected, Aziraphale becomes just as restless as the demon now asleep next to him. Crowley has nodded off, head tipped to the back of his seat and chest rising up and down slowly. His eyes twitch barely open when Aziraphale sets his finished book on the seat next to him, but they shut again soon. He just wants to take a walk, so he leaves the room and wanders down the hall, smiling at passing students and looking for anything interesting, such as a good conversation, book, or dining car. He finds his attention caught in the form of a worried looking boy running across the hall and chasing a toad. His teeth stick out and bite his lip, his hair drops messily into his face, and he’d easily be mistaken for Harry from behind if their skin tone was the same. A girl — brown, curly hair tied up in a ponytail and brushing against her dark brown skin — runs through. She looks almost like Pepper if Pepper worried about adult problems, like taxes and terrorist negotiations.

“Excuse me?” He turns into the car they’d run to curiously, watching as they freeze at his voice. A toad croaks somewhere within the room. “It’s alright,” he explains hastily, smiling and putting his hands up in surrender. The black-haired boy sighs in relief and the girl smiles politely at Aziraphale. “What’s the problem, if you do not mind me asking?”

“I- erm-“ the boy’s relief at not being in trouble has faded, and he returns to nervousness. He wrings his hands and sweats in anxiety, tears springing to his eyes and his breath quickening. The girl quickly comes to his defense and walks to his side.

“Neville lost his toad,” she says, sounding sorry, hiding what is perhaps exasperation. “We’re just trying to find him, sir.”

“Ah!” He unclasps his hands and walks forward, sneaking up behind the slimy thing -- the toad had been hiding in the corner of the room -- and grabbing it in his hands tightly. A quick miracle and it falls asleep. “Here it is.”

The boy — Neville — brightens immeasurably — and takes the toad in shaking hands. “Thank you, Mr…”

“Professor Fell,” he tells the boy, and he holds his hand out. Neville shakes it gently, then the brown-haired girl follows along, a bit aggressive, and smiles at him. “And what is your name, young woman?”

“Hermione Granger,” she says, in the tone of someone who had been practicing her introductions. “It’s nice to meet a professor before school. What are you teaching?”

“I’m not officially a teacher of anything,” he says. “But I’m the librarian, and I go by Professor nonetheless.” 

“Oh!” She brightens again. “I _love_ books!”

“Do you have any on herbology?” Neville asks shyly, coming forward. Aziraphale looks at him and the boy steps back in anxiety before he realizes the professor is beaming At him. Aziraphale hopes he comes off as gentle, now. The boy seems as skittish as Harry could be at times, but even more visibly anxious. Harry had become quite proficient at hiding his emotions during his life with the Dursley’s — Neville had not developed such nuance. Not that Aziraphale minded, at all, in fact — he was glad to know when he was breaking some invisible boundary.

“I’m sure there are hundreds, dear child.” He nods to himself, before getting a wonderful idea. “Actually, I happen to know the Herbology professor himself! Maybe he could look with you?”

Neville brightens astronomically and the toad in his hands croaks, trying to escape. “Could I?” His eyes fall. “It wouldn’t be strange?”

“Not at all!” The door opens right before Aziraphale can finish responding. Harry and Ron come running in, looking determined, if a little confused.

”we saw your-“ Ron cuts himself off and points at the toad. “Oh, wicked!”

“Azir-“ Harry covers his mistake with a cough and averts his eyes nervously. Aziraphale just shrugs helplessly. “Professor Fell?”

“Ah, Harry, that’s your godfather, innit?” Ron chews on a licorice whip and grins. “Where’s the tall one?” 

“It is nice to see you all again,” he says, a little overwhelmed. “But shouldn’t you all be in your carriages?”

They mull it over for a minute, and all of them shrug, save from Hermione. The girl purses her lips and frowns, before telling them that: “Yes, we should.” She looks up to Aziraphale. “This is our cabin — me and Neville’s, I mean — we just had to go look for his toad.”

“Ah.” He clasps his hands together. “Perfectly understandable, my dear.” He nods and catches the first signs of orange sunset outside the window. “Well, we must be arriving soon. It’s beginning to get dark. You’d all best get back to your cars, please!”

Hermione sits. Neville follows her example and starts hushing his agitated toad, looking for his case, which has seemed to disappear. Aziraphale spots a dark green portable enclosure shoved half under a seat, and leans over, plucking it from its hidden spot and handing it to the boy, who gapes at him for a second before taking it and smiling wide.

“Thanks, Professor,” he says, pressing a thumb to the toad’s back and petting it before he pushes it into its enclosure. “Trevor is always getting loose, and I can never remember where I put his case.”

“That’s perfectly alright, Neville…” he frowns. “What did you say your last name was?”

“Longbottom.” He blushes. “It’s... A family name.”

“I understand,” he says, remembering the time Crowley still went by his own unfortunate family given name. _Crawly._ What a mess that monicker had been. “Just try and keep track of the case next time, Mr. Longbottom, or he might truly escape.”

“I will!” The boy nods quickly and gives him a thumbs up.

Now, Aziraphale turns to the rest of them, still standing in the doorway.

“Mr. Weasley. Mr. Potter.” He smiles briefly. “Please, head back to your cabins. I don’t think the Trolley woman likes to be left with empty rooms, dears.” He was starting getting off track, and he realizes that with a start. He’s supposed to be a professor now — not someone just as irresponsible as Crowley -- he shouldn’t even be in this car. “Erm- anyway.” He clears his throat. “Again, Children, please make your ways back.”

“Sure thing, Professor!” Ron grins and salutes. His licorice whip hangs from his mouth like a toothpick as he escapes the room, leaving Harry alone with the expectation he’ll chase after him.

“See you at school, Aziraphale,” Harry says, grinning as much as his new friend. He makes sure to say “Aziraphale” quietly enough that no one notices the oddly biblical and gratuitously large name. The angel nods at him and allows a quick, but still loving, smile before he turns back around to Hermione and Neville, Harry running off behind Ron.

“It was wonderful to meet you,” he explains with clasped hands and another smile, which the two return earnestly. “But I really must be going.” 

“Same to you!” Hermione lets out a flashy, toothy grin. He follows the other students out, walking back into the Professors cabin before he realizes he hadn’t even found what he was looking for.

\---

When they get to Hogwarts, they climb from the train along with all other students. They’re the last to leave -- they help check the train for anyone asleep -- and they climb onto carriages headed by Thestrals. The horses sniffle and dance about in a moment before they settle, dropping their hooves and carrying them onwards. 

Trees drip with condensation. The midnight sky ripples with the life of birds, fairies, stars, and everything else unknown. The first beside them beckons with whispered calls, but the two just bring themselves to an amicable conversation, soft and lofty. When the castle first comes into view, it is a sight to behold. 

Crowley and Aziraphale have seen their fair share of castles. Great ones, small ones, noble ones and those corrupt with despair and destitute. Brick, marble, granite, moss, stone. It’s all come and gone through their lifetime. They’ve seen it being built from the ground, then toppling with disrepair. They’re a fleeting beauty, really. Simple constructions to flaunt wealth and power.

Hogwarts is a sight to _behold._

It’s great, swooping towers, their shadow casting something deeper than darkness. Yellowing lights erupt from all about the castle walls — orange, fire, lamplight, wandlight — and coalesces into one, fiery pillar pinpricked with light. The stone ripples with moss and a surprising youthfulness. It stuns Aziraphale into an awesome silence, and Crowley laughs in something just short of disbelief. It’s rather pretty for an ancient, human-made building.

They’re brought directly into the headmaster’s office once they arrive, given almost no time to search around and see what they’re going to be dwelling in. Minerva McGonagall — a severe — yet fair looking woman, escorts the two around the stretching hallways and up to a statue. She talks to it as if it’s alive and it opens, stairs trickling downwards obediently. She walks in and they travel behind her, Crowley’s hand trailing against the wall. 

Albus Dumbledore is an ancient, bright-eyed and bespectacled man who looks at them with an expression that can only be described as secretive. It manages to unnerve Crowley, if only a bit, and he shifts around in the seat he is led to. Aziraphale looks a fair amount calmer as the headmaster brings an old and torn hat to them.

“This,” he tells them, quiet, sharp, his first words after a short introduction. “Is the sorting hat. I understand that you did not have the opportunity to attend Hogwarts when you were of age.” He sets it down on his desk and sits, popping a small yellow candy into his mouth. “Lemondrop?”

“Oh, thank you,” Aziraphale says, warm. He accepts it and tucks it into his pocket. Crowley just shakes his head. 

“You’re very welcome.” He pushes his glasses up his nose again. “So, I would like for you to be sorted into a house before you begin teaching.”

“It’s a little late for that, innit?” Crowley crosses his arms, eyebrows raising under his sunglasses. Dumbledore only nods, passive.

“We had intended to bring you two in before today, but this seemed to be the most simple option in the long run.”

“How does it work?” Aziraphale asks, staring at the hat. It’s unassuming. A brown, torn leather, hat, withered with age and fraying around its edges. It looks almost facelike. 

“Put it on, and you will see.” 

Aziraphale levels Dumbledore with a _complicated_ look. When his staring contest fails, he picks it up with a look that solely communicated: “ok, I’ll do this even if it sounds stupendously irrational." When he settles it upon his head, though -- it erupts with life, face-like features warping into an actual silhouette. Crowley jumps skittishly away from it and Aziraphale, while the man in question raises his eyebrows and opens his mouth with a confused question poised on his lips, just as the hat begins to speak.

“You,” it begins, a bit haughty, “Should _not_ be under my brim.”

“Well.” Aziraphale shrugs, undeterred. “I am, _So_ sorry, chap.”

“Albus,” the hat continues, swiveling on Aziraphale’s head with an aghast expression. “Must I do this one? This is pathetic, I shouldn’t be doing this one. ”

“He’s a professor now. They both are.” Dumbledore nods at him to continue, taking his spectacles off and running a piece of cloth against them.

“Fine.” It practically leaps back around. “This one is…” It frowns. “Interesting…" It resumes talking to Aziraphale after a silent moment. It seems a little confused. "You’re cunning. Prideful… But plenty of bravery and loyalty as well. Smart as a whip, and certainly enough capacity to learn more. You’re... A fighter, but you’re not, at the same time. You've got incredible kindness behind you, too. A bit of everything I suppose.” He seems to mull it over for a minute more. "I should be putting you into… Hufflepuff, really, you're a bloody _angel,_ what in the holy hell is Albus expecting. Oh well. Nothing to help it.” Then, he declares, with a resounding, final voice: 

“RAVENCLAW!”

“And what does that mean?” Aziraphale asks, lifting the hat off of his head and passing it on towards Crowley. The Demon takes it with a bizarre, confused expression on his face. 

“Ravenclaw are those with an aptitude for intelligence, and for wit. You have wisdom, and you’re creative, yet I do believe the hat means to say you would’ve made a good Hufflepuff as well.” Dumbledore continues when they show no understanding. “They’re kind, and giving, and the most loyal of the houses. It seems you’ve proven sharp enough for Ravenclaw.”

Aziraphale nods and Crowley settles the hat on his own head.

_"ARE YOU BLOODY JOKING?"_

Its shouts rattle the room, and Crowley almost tosses it onto the floor. He hisses loudly at the noise but keeps the brim on. It dips over his eyes.

“I’m practically obligated to put this wanker in Slytherin,” it raves. _“The Bloody SNAKE himself!”_

It roars one last time and leaves everyone -- especially Dumbledore -- looking ridiculously confused. 

“You’re more Slytherin than Salazar by nature, but you’re probably the bloody nicest snake I’ve ever encountered." Crowley grumbles at the accusation, and Aziraphale holds in a laugh at the memories of that day before the nope-pocalypse. Crowley probably left a dent in that wall when he'd aimed Aziraphale straight into it. At least it wasn't as flimsy as American -- or hell's -- walls. “You’re smart, sharper than a fang, but you’ve also got some sort of laziness to you."

 _"Snakes,”_ It sneers, finally, before proclaiming, in one, mighty, yet exasperated and a little annoyed call: 

“GRYFFINDOR!”

Crowley winces and finally rips the hat off, clearly grateful to be rid of it. “Wazzat mean?” Crowley asks, still slumping in a sullen posture. 

He’s given no answer other than a soft: “Walk with me, please.” Dumbledore picks the still grumbling hat off the table. “The students should be arriving soon.” All three of them walk from the office, striding purposefully to a great mass of voices, a chorus ringing through the eerily empty halls, all threading together and shouting about. “Gryffindor,” Dumbledore begins, “Is the house for those who are brave. It seems that you have more than enough Slytherin traits to join _them_ , but your loyalty and bravery ultimately shone through.”

The tempter, the devil's henchman, the wiley evil snake doesn’t have a response to that, other than a hiss.

They end up before a pair of massive, great doors, looming over the three. They're carved with what looks like almost religious effigies, depicting figures in stone and marble, weathered down with age and the general wear of a school. Dumbledore opens them with a simple tap of his wand, carrying the hat within and urging Crowley and Aziraphale to follow him.

The hall is massive.

The ceiling splashes with light rain, and thunder rumbles in the swirling, magical portraiture. Many tables split the ground and end in a few large paths winding them forward towards the largest table. Candlelight flickers about as they pass marvelous floating fires, hung with no strings against the wall. The Angel and Demon look about in silent wonder, twirling to look before they’re led up to their seats. It’s more like the Heavens have opened above them than a simple spell has created this awe-inspiring painting. Hagrid smiles at them, broad, toothy, and waves a little, mouthing something unintelligible. The two smile back — Crowley fanged, Aziraphale soft — but both genuine. 

The hall, even with its stars and galaxies that Crowley analyzes for mistakes and finds none in, feels eerily empty. Not a voice rings out beside the quiet muttering of the teachers along the table, and the shuffling of robes. A greasy-haired man eyeballs the two new arrivals with a narrow, irritated stare as if he’s trying to gut them like fish. 

All of a sudden, the doors clap open, and hundreds of children stampede in.

They all file into (not so neat) lines at their tables and sit, massive banners above them unfurling till they hang and swing in the nonexistent wind, each house crest on them. A sea of green, red, yellow and blue drifts about, talking with each other and excitedly waiting for something new to happen. Dumbledore stands from his spot at the table and picks the hat up with his ascent, walking calmly to a simple and slightly out of place bench standing at the top of the miniature stairwell. He waits there. The students — for the most part — ignore him entirely. Neither Crowley nor Azirpahale see a single familiar face outside of the Weasley’s mixed in with a massive red sea of Gryffindors. 

They can both hear the whispers from their seats. Children hushing each other before rumors can start, and others boldly encouraging them.

“He’s gotta be a Slytherin,” one child muses. “That’s why Snape’s glowering at him.”

“Other ones a Hufflepuff, I bet you a gallon of fire whiskey.” Someone takes the bet and grins.

“Why’s he got glasses on?" They point at Crowley and shy away when they're seen. "Think he’s a wanker, keeping them on inside?”

“They look _weird.”_

Both Crowley and Aziraphale share amused glances at the antics of their soon to be students.

“Guess we stand out a little then,” Crowley sighs out, sipping from his drink. It’s the only thing on the table. Aziraphale looks a little disappointed at the lack of a spread.

“Er-“ Aziraphale laughs. “As always, I suppose my dear. We _are_ new here.”

The next wave of people comes with a great bang — the doors come slashing through the air like a great gust of wind, Minerva tapping forward promptly, a proper row of first years trailing behind her and looking around in varying degrees of fear or nerves or astonishment. Harry looks up at the table and the three teachers he knows, yet his look seems to go straight through them, and he turns back to the simple hat sitting rapt with attention on the podium. 

The hat, rather suddenly, begins to sing. 

_"Oh, you may not think I'm pretty,_

_But don't judge on what you see,_

_I'll eat myself if you can find_

_A smarter hat than me._

_You can keep your bowlers black,_

_Your top hats sleek and tall,_

_For I'm the Hogwarts Sorting Hat_

_And I can cap them all._

_There's nothing hidden in your head_

_The Sorting Hat can't see,_

_So try me on and I will tell you_

_Where you ought to be._

_You might belong in Gryffindor,_

_Where dwell the brave at heart,_

_Their daring, nerve, and chivalry_

_Set Gryffindors apart;_

_You might belong in Hufflepuff,_

_Where they are just and loyal,_

_Those patient Hufflepuffs are true_

_And unafraid of toil;_

_Or yet in wise old Ravenclaw, if you've a ready mind,_

_Where those of wit and learning,_

_Will always find their kind;_

_Or perhaps in Slytherin_

_You'll make your real friends,_

_Those cunning folk use any means_

_To achieve their ends._

_So put me on! Don't be afraid!_

_And don't get in a flap!_

_You're in safe hands (though I have none)_

_For I'm a Thinking Cap!"_

The song ends right before the hall bursts in cheers and applause. The Hat’s head bows slowly, as well as a hat can, fabric creasing, then becomes quite still again. Crowley and Aziraphale both grin madly, only just having found out their own identities within the Hogwarts houses and only just realizing how hilariously important they are within the school. Crowley is still a little sore over the fact that he isn't put with the snakes, but the two of them both laugh at the ridiculous song.

The first years look quite a bit relieved at the idea that all they need to do is try on a _hat._

Minerva now steps forward, holding a very long and very yellow scroll. “When I call your name,” she announces, in a clear, steady voice, “you will put on the hat and sit on the stool to be sorted." She searches the room for objections, then begins.

"Abott, Hannah!”

A girl with a pink, blushing face and quivering ponytails stumbles awkwardly towards the hat and drapes it onto the top of her messy curls. It flies down and over her eyes, but she makes no move to adjust it. After a moment of deliberation:

“HUFFLEPUFF!”

The table on the right cheers in excitement at their new member, yellow erupting into vibrant movement as she grins and flounces over. A pale, shivering ghost receives her at her spot, and smiles. He’s large, and dressed in a monks garb. 

“Bones, Susan!”

It settles on her head and thinks. Then, again:

“HUFFLEPUFF!”

She walks confidently to her table and greets her clapping welcome with a happy smile.

“Boot, Terry!”

“RAVENCLAW!”

Aziraphale can't suppress a giddy little smile. The child beams and runs to his spot at the table, greeted by a few children with books in their laps or smiles like Aziraphale’s. Crowley grins at all of the sorted. The excitement is palpable, and tasteful, and appears like a fine wine upon someone’s lips. 

“Brown, Lavender” becomes the first Gryffindor, and Crowley’s smile widens. She’s met with the most deafening screams — mostly because of how aggressively loud the group of red-bannered children forces themselves to be — he can hear Fred and George shouting through their midst. 

They work down the line. A girl named “Granger, Hermione—“ the one that Aziraphale had told him about — is named a Gryffindor soon after she puts the hat on. Other choices take the hat more time to decide. 

“Finnigan, Seamus,” is on the chair for almost a minute before being declared the same as the girl before. 

“Malfoy, Draco,” barely sits down before the hat us announced him a “SLYTHERIN!” 

They work through all of the names one by one, till only one person remains, and—

“Potter, Harry!”

Murmurs, whispers, gasps, they all fly around the room. 

“Is it really him?”

“Potter? Like… _Potter_ Potter?”

“What did she say?”

They settle down to a hush as the boy walks up to the stool. He looks nauseous, and he’s sweating, but he pushes his hair back from his forehead in determination and swallows down his worries. It takes him a moment to climb the stool. He drops the hat on his head, and it slides down, covering his winding scar and wide eyes. His glasses fall down his nose, but he makes no move to adjust them now. He pushes the hat back up, and his Godfathers watch as it starts to talk. It’s almost impossible to hear — quiet, nearly silent whispers into the child’s ear. The only words they aren’t forced to strain for is a barked out: 

_“Not Slytherin?”_

They continue listening tensely and the hat dissolves back into secretive whispers yet again. Aziraphale looks a little worried, in fact, and Crowley taps his fingers impatiently. 

“Well, if you’re sure,” it says in a pleasantly normal voice. It seems to shrug. “Better be..."

_"GRYFFINDOR!”_

The loudest screams yet start to burst from the red table, along with stomping, clapping, and any other matter of noises — including whistles from Fred and George. He’s accepted by a ghost, neck rimmed in red, eyes twinkling grey. Crowley can’t help but let out a tiny, hissing, “yessss” at his godson's placement, not even ashamed into stifling his pride. Harry slides on a grin and shuffles into a seat next to Ron, who beams as wide as a summer day and high fives the boy.

\---

Hogsmeade is small. Quaint. Lovely, and probably anything Aziraphale would’ve wanted had he not already had his flat. For Crowley, half of his time there is spent admiring the massive and broken house not far out of the town bounds. Aziraphale and he have rented twin apartments in the same building and promptly teleport right back to their homes once they go inside. It’s not that they dislike Hogwarts or Hogsmeade. They just like their own homes and own comforts quite a bit more than tricky staircase, annoying talking portraits, and new rooms with nothing within them -- a lot more. Hogwarts is still strange either way -- whether they enjoy the area or not. Winding, senseless, cavernous, broken. None of it makes a single piece of sense, and Crowley and Aziraphale both conclude that while they both should have been alive long enough to not encounter much more bafflement, here they are.

“Well,” Crowley muses, nursing a good, vintage bottle of wine. It sloshes in his glass. Aziraphale sits across from him and pets the leaf of a shivering fern. “I s’ppose, we do like humans. And- and - and they’re surprising. W’ like that.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments, feedback, kudos. They make my heart happy, so feel free to leave some.


	3. Halloween

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So! We progress through the first part of the year, up until spooky Halloween. Obscurum and Candor, two spells used in here, are ones I made up. One removes all natural light from an intended space, and the other restores it.
> 
> Hope you enjoy!

_ Lectures. _

That is what they’d advised Crowley to do for most of his first year of teaching. He didn’t have any recorded magical teaching experience, so by their logic he should build some up before teaching his students anything real. Lectures about plants and their uses -- boring droning on about mint and Minthe or flytraps and Rocky Horror Picture Show. Hogwarts had too many greenhouses as beautiful, lush and expansive as it’s got, and they wanted him to do  _ lectures. _

Needless to say, the resident fallen angel is loath to follow the rules.

“Devil’s Snare,” he begins on his first afternoon, carrying a pot of writhing vines about in one arm with his wand sparkling white light above it, leading it to shrink away from him. “Is one of the many breeds of carnivorous plants in the world.”

He moves his wand away and it begins to attack. It starts winding, crawling, feverishly dragging itself up his arms to the alarm of the spectators. It digs into his skin, choking him for air, constricting around his throat, and it takes a moment for him to adjust, but his useless lungs stop working when he tells them to.

“As you can see,” he says with a wicked grin, fangs bared to the room as the very annoyed snare starts to settle softly around his shoulders. It seems to be waiting for him to pass out. He pets it softly. He’s grown a little fond of it. “It’ll choke you to death before you can say  _ Wahoo.” _

Each student, wands lit over their pot, looks just a bit more terrified. Only a few look confident in their wandwork. Crowley spots the edges of the vine creeping out from a student’s pot, and he saunters over, his wand pressing right into its edges and burning the tendrils back.

“Finnagin!” He claps his hands together and grins, behind the child and waiting for him to turn around and face him. The vine moves about, annoyed at being rudely jostled on its perch. “Mind demonstrating what happens when someone really  _ does  _ stop paying bloody  _ attention _ to their  _ murder vines? _ ”

The boy shakes his head and gups, finally stopping his incessant whispers to the boy next to him and focusing more on his plant. Laughter rings around the room, and Crowley smiles encouragingly at it. He’d rather the kid be embarrassed into remembering than dead. Another boy -- Neville, Crowley’d not gotten a chance to talk to him yet -- raises his hand.

“Ah!” Crowley points to him with his wand. “Longbottom!”

“S- sir,” he begins, looking a little worried as the vine on Crowley’s shoulders begins constricting about the crown of his head as well. The demon shoves his glasses up and pushes the vine over to the left a little. It starts braiding into his hair. “How- why hasn’t it…” He swallows. “K-killed you?”

“Excellent question!” He yanks the sturdy plant off of his crown and it wraps around his fist, advancing up his arm again like a snake before his wand lights up with light again and it shrinks away from him, dropping into a container with four yellow lamps trained directly into its contents. He’ll return it to the chamber guarding the stone later. For now, it rests at the bottom of the crate and cowers. He feels a little bad about it.

“And,” he continues lazily, leaning back on the table behind him and spinning his wand in his hands. “One that I won’t get around to answering-” He points to the boy- “Because then you’ll all go around  _ attempting it.”  _

(Though Crowley knows there are certainly defense spells to keep yourself from being choked to death by devils snare -- he also knows that he is also too lazy to learn them. He’ll just live with the bruises the plant gives him for a bit. They smart, but he knows how to wear a good turtleneck.)

“But-” Neville shrinks away from Crowley’s sharp grin.

“The only defense you all need to know is  _ light,”  _ he tells them, before sweeping his hands out and calling out, in one loud shout:

_ “OBSCURUM!” _

The room is plunged into an inky darkness. The sunlight recedes as if attacked, crawling out of the glass and back into the sky. The whole room pulsates with darkness, and the only remaining lights almost seem dangerously low. A few students let out shrill noises of worry as the sunlight seems to be extinguished, but Crowley just scowls and lights his wand. The other student’s wands stay close to their pots. Some hands shake, some eyes twitch, some people sweat with a nervous fear. Crowley scoffs at it all — he wouldn’t let any of them get hurt — and he strides about the room, watching.

“Ten points to Ravenclaw,” he says, tapping the table next to one of the girls as she focuses, undeterred by the void of blackness about her. He swoops towards Neville, Hermione, Harry and Ron. Hermione and Neville look completely unafraid.

“Twenty points to Gryffindor,” he says, proud, before-

The light from Neville’s wand drops out, black flooding the space where white had just occupied. The vines swarm towards him, and the boy trips backwards in fear. 

Crowley is at his side in an instant, wand’s piercing light suddenly jammed into the Devil’s Snare’s vines. It screams at him and shrinks, but he just tells it to “shut up,” as he turns to his student. Neville watches a few feet away, enveloped in the blackness, as Crowley picks the pot up.

“Now,” he says, holding his wand close to it so the whole greenhouse classroom can see. “Each of you -- take your pot and walk over to the bin-  _ carefully! -  _ and set your devils snare inside!” He looks around. “Each person to correctly put it inside -- yes, Patil, it’s by the lamps -- may be dismissed!”

As people begin to file towards the box, he turns back to Neville, who flinches away and stares blankly.

“You were doing  _ fine,”  _ Crowley reminds him, waving his wand about and raising his eyebrows together in confusion. “Why’d you stop?

Neville gulps. “I - I”   
  
“It’s not his wand, Professor Crowley.” 

The girl from earlier comes up without her pot, behind them. “It's his father’s.”

He looks back at Neville and frowns at the agreeing nod he’s given. 

“Why in the levels of-“ he thinks. “Earth, don’t you have your own wand?” He glances back around as someone squeals at the box. “OI! Put it in the crate and go, Malfoy!’

The boy stomps away and out of the room. Crowley turns back to Neville. 

“It’s my dad’s,” Neville says softly. “My grandmother gave it to me. Said it should be passed down since he can’t use it.”

At this, Crowley softens, setting the pot on the table. He leans back against the wood, elbows on the table and wand stirring lazily against the tendrils in the pot.

“I don’t know  _ what  _ good that’s gonna do you if you get  _ \-- well, I don’t know --  _ killed. Wands aren’t sssomething to be messed with.” 

“She- ...I don’t wanna disappoint my dad,” Neville whispers back hoarsely, fingers wandering over the wooden shell of his father’s wand.

“I’m sure he’d be a lot more disappointed,” Crowley grumbles, picking the pot back up. “If you got  _ killed,  _ Longbottom.”

He looks to the crate. It’s full. And -- it’s angry. The room has emptied out. 

“CANDOR!” He shouts, pointing to the sky with his wand. The sunlight is returned in full. He blinks back the brightness and hisses under his breath, sliding the rest of the devils snare in the crate then wrestling a huge top on, sealing it with a latch. Neville watches him and fiddles with his wand. As Crowley turns back around, he recedes again. 

Crowley gestures to the wand. Neville sets it cautiously in his hands, and he drags it up to eye level, squinting at it. There’s already a hairline fissure along its edge.

“It’s going to snap eventually,” Crowley tells Neville, handing the wand back to him matter of factly. He runs a hand through his hair and shrugs. “Y’ can either get a new one or let this one snap in half. Or -- it could always get you hurt, Longbottom.” He pauses to let the sympathetic silence simmer for a moment. “It isn’t your  _ wand,”  _ he tells him, spreading his arms out wide. 

The kid nods and tucks the wand into his pocket.

\---

From the library, Aziraphale is the first to see Harry take that steep dive to the ground. It looks like suicide by broomstick. 

(Hermione, Ron, and Harry had all become fast friends, and Aziraphale was hoping that this would lead to a bit more common sense being filtered through the group. They were all Gryffindors, and if they were anything like Crowley, then that spelled s-c-a-r-y n-e-w-s. Obviously he had been mistaken in Ms. Granger’s common sense.)

So, as Aziraphale watches his adopted ward pitch down the side of the castle -- knuckles whitening and hair flushed against his skull as he plunges -- he feels a little bit of what might be regret along with his fear. He’s quick to jump out of his seat, setting a particularly fascinating book young Ms. Granger had lent him about the history of Hogwarts onto the table. He begins to run through the building, hoping he won’t have to interrupt one of Crowley’s classes to tell him his godchild was taking an unprompted visit to Madam Pomfrey’s. He feels a headache start to ache in his temples as he travels, and the pain is quickly interrupted by him bumping right into Minerva.

“Oh!” She steadies herself while he stammers a hurried apology, then levels him with squinted eyes and worried gaze. “Azira, is everything alright?”

“Oh, hm, yes! I’m quite alright,” he tells her absentmindedly, making to walk off before he realizes that she’d started going in the same direction. “Did-”

“Did I just see Potter pitch himself out of the sky on a  _ broomstick? _ ” She nods and walks alongside him, determination renewed tenfold. Aziraphale starts to worry about his ward a little. “I have  _ no  _ idea what he was thinking, but I saw him land, that is for sure.”

“Oh?” Aziraphale lets out a small, reflexive breath of relief. He’d been more nervous that Harry had gotten hurt than he had been of him getting in trouble, anyways. “And… erm, if you don’t mind me asking, what is your idea?”

(The five stages of anger are as thus stated:

An action triggering _ anger. _

Feeling  _ anger. _

The impulse to act on your  _ anger. _

Acting on your  _ anger. _

Immediately being relieved.

Recovery from _ anger. _

Repair.

And, finally, risk of recurrence.

Through all of his years, Aziraphale had found these to generally be quite accurate. When one was angry, they went along a typical binary. Anger was a human thing by nature, but it had been the Angel’s originally. It was one of the reasons for the great Fall. Aziraphale knew he was a bit of an expert on it.

He’d just watched Minerva go through all of the stages in less than a second, and maybe make a few of her own.)

“That boy needs a  _ broomstick.” _

Aziraphale, in the end, has to agree. 

Harry’s flight was striking. A deep, somehow-graceful dive, and it was eerily similar to the way Raphael used to fly, splitting the air with great and furious swooping. The broomstick the boy had been using is still settled in his gloved hands as he whoops and high-fives his friend, ignoring Hermione’s disapproving looks and cheering on Ron’s excited ones. Minerva stomps forward with all of the grace and anger of an endangered  _ swan, _ and Aziraphale walks purposefully behind her. He puts on a disappointed look and braces himself for the conversation to ensue.

“ _ Harry POTTER!” _

The boy whips around frantically. His eyes are wide, and Aziraphale shudders at the frightened looks on his face. He almost has to ask Minerva to stop, but she must determine the wild look in the boy’s eyes isn’t guilt -- more like terror -- because she lowers her voice and drops her furrowed brow some. Still, she allows the same disappointment into her tone, clearly not willing to let his breach of the rules go.

“Never — In  _ all my time at Hogwarts—“  _ she cuts herself off to regard the rest of the group with shocked silence. 

Aziraphale finally breaks his silence. “Harry, you might’ve broken your neck,” he chastises, worried, knotting his eyebrows and lips together in a frown.

“It wasn’t his fault, Professor-“

Minerva cuts the girl off before her sentence can end. “Be quiet, Miss Patil-“

“But Malfoy-“

“That’s enough, Mr. Weasley.” Minerva gestures towards Harry with one hand. The boy gulps. “Potter. Follow me, now.”

Aziraphale catches sight of Malfoy and his friends just as Harry is leaving. He pauses at the sight of them — snickering and pointing — mouthing things to each other. It takes a moment of deliberation -- but he decides this battle is one he’ll work on if it means getting to the root of why Harry did something so… reckless.

He walks over to Ron, who is angry and on what Aziraphale thinks is the verge of shouting while he practically vibrates with rage. Hermione crosses her arms and looks away from the boy, visibly upset at Harry’s trouble but unaware of what to do about it and maybe a bit unknowing of why she  _ cares. _

“Weasley,” Aziraphale says, gentle. “You said something about Malfoy?”

“He-“ The boy throws an accusing, trembling hand out to point at Malfoy, who sneers in surprise. “Stole Neville’s remembrall. He flew up-“ he tosses his hand into the sky now, still shaking with the injustice of it all. “There, and threw it as far as he bloody could!” 

“Harry just helped Neville — who is  _ now  _ in the infirmary with a broken arm — get it back,” Hermione points out good naturedly, if a little hesitant. “He did something  _ stupid,”  _ she does admit, and readily, “But for a good reason.”

Now, with the whole story, Aziraphale finds himself nodding at the two in understanding, straightening back up a little and twisting on the edges of his heels, his robes flowing behind him as he turns to Malfoy. The boy has begun to sneakily creep away, his lackeys following behind him and making too much noise for a group of people trying to get away untouched. 

“Mr. Malfoy,” he says, cold. He’s aware that this child has only been built by his parents influences — but this cannot go unpunished. “Twenty points from Slytherin,” he tells the boy, ignoring the outraged expression on his face and instead plastering a neutral expression and tone to his facade. “Please meet me in the library for a meeting during your final free period.”

The boy gapes in anger. Something looks off in his expression. Fear, or uncertainty? Aziraphale can’t quite see it. “I only took that sniveling idiot’s-“

“Calm yourself, Mr. Malfoy,” he instructs. Aziraphale softens and walks forward again, with a smile. It’s genuine. “You seem like a perfectly fine boy. I’m sorry you’ve been raised into ignorance.”

Malfoy scoffs at that, leaning forward with a sneer that’s mirrored across all of his friend’s faces. 

“My father,” he inserts, almost growling, “Will hear about this.”

“I’m sure he will.” 

Aziraphale nods one last time to the boy before he walks away. The rest of the class resumes waiting in silence.

\---

“So you- erm- repeat it.” Crowley spreads his lanky limbs out underneath Rubeus’s table, knocking his knees against the supports of the table and settling his arms out on the table, frowning while gnawing on a burnt biscuit. Harry sits across from him and abandons his own biscuit on a plate, fiddling with his glasses nervously.

“He defended Neville!” Ron grins, bites into one of the biscuits, and winces. “He saves his bloody remembral and got in trouble for it, because Malfoy is a bloody-”

“Yeah, but Harry isn’t a professional broomsticker, or- or _ whatever _ y’ call them,’ Crowley says, before Ron can start cursing and Aziraphale can ask him to stop. He waves a dismissive hand and accepts a cup of tea from Rubeus. “Thank you.” 

“‘Course.” Rubeus sits next to him. Aziraphale shifts in his seat on the other side of Crowley.

“They’re called Quidditch players, dear.” Aziraphale sips from his tea, but smiles. “And you know that. I saw you eyeing the broomsticks at Diagon Alley.”

“And/ and now you’re a  _ seeker?”  _ Crowley flips his glasses off his head and sets them on the table, drinking some more and ignoring Aziraphale’s attempt to tease him. No one comments on his eyes, and he grins — a great, creeping slit against his mouth broken only by teeth. “That’s bloody  _ brilliant.” _

“Crowley!” Aziraphale sets his hand on Crowley’s arm. “We mustn’t praise this-“

“Oh, calm it  _ down,  _ Angel.” Crowley’s smile shortens. It’s a bit warmer, more fond, now, as if he’s reminiscing in the past. He sips more tea and snorts. “He’s acting just like  _ you  _ would’ve.”

The table laughs, and Harry looks as if he wants to ask more. “Oh, do leave me alone, Crowley.” Aziraphale drinks more tea again and pretends not to smile.

“Well, I think it was a bit reckless, don’t you?” Hermione frowns and studies Crowley’s eyes for a moment before looking away. He glares at her, and she starts avoiding his face.

Harry frowns at her now. “I mean, I don’t even know if I can do Quidditch. I’ve never tried it before.” He pauses and glances between Crowley and his friend. “Stop analyzing my Godfather.”

“I-” She blushes indignantly and takes another drink, forgetting she’d asked for what was apparently the worst brew of tea she’d ever had. She glares even harder and continues while still blushing, somehow bright against her dark skin. Crowley nearly laughs. “Harry, of _ course  _ you can,” Hermione grounds out reluctantly. “It’s in your  _ blood.” _

“What do you mean?” Harry frowns again. 

She sighs. “Hagrid, do you have any…” she looks about the room and spots a heavy, brilliantly gold book. “Can I borrow that?” It says “yearbook” in shiny gold lettering across its dark red spine. 

“Oh, that? Of course.” Hagrid reaches behind him and picks it up. He sets it on the table and Hermione picks it up, blowing off the dust from the cover. Aziraphale watches in interest.

She spends a good five minutes in silence flipping through pages — dusty ones, ripped ones, stained ones — the book seems to have lost time under Hagrid’s care. He doesn’t seem to enjoy nostalgia, but no one can blame him, knowing that he’d been expelled. Finally, she finds her page. The awards and trophies for the graduating class that year.

“James Potter,” she reads, tapping on a shifting photo of Harry’s father, grinning madly and yanking a trophy about in the air. “Greatest Seeker.”

Harry’s eyes widen. So do Rons, albeit a bit comically. Crowley sits up in the same attention that Aziraphale had been paying, and scans the page. 

“Blimey Harry, you didn’t tell me your dad played  _ Quidditch!”  _ Ron grins, peering into the book and taking a sudden interest. 

Harry, on the other hand, just looks shocked. Crowley nudges his leg under the table gently and prompts him to respond. The boy looks up at him, smiles, and looks away to stare back into the book, a little shellshocked. His mouth falls open in a sigh as he reads the name, quiet, too himself.

“I didn’t know,” he tells Ron softly, a hand tracing a circle into the trophy. 

\---

Crowley thinks that that will be his last interaction with his godson -- or anyone else -- for that night. He’d volunteered to patrol the castle for the night, making it his shift day, and he did so gladly, hands tucked behind his back and glasses not even on any longer while he expertly maneuvered around. It was quiet, his footsteps nearly silent, his breathing (only a habit now) impossible to hear but for himself. The stairs are tired and nearly still. The paintings snore, or whisper, passing rumors or love songs as people always do on late nights. The entire castle is a whirl of earthly silence, and the only thing he could ask for right now is quiet conversation with Aziraphale. Maybe, if their patrol schedules ever met up, they would have just that.

Today’s development had been interesting. He hadn’t known too much about Harry’s parents before today -- neither Aziraphale or Harry liked to talk about them -- and he was content to learn when they wanted him to. Hearing that Harry had come from a line of expert fliers really didn’t surprise him. Behind the years of built-up anxiety and quiet, he was certainly a daring, excited kid, reminding Crowley of himself before the Fall. It had felt as if her rules hadn’t applied to him, then. He reckoned Harry probably felt the same way.

After all of the interesting events of the day, Crowley didn’t expect to see any of the children until their botany classes or their meals. They’d surely be asleep.

He has to rethink that thought when he hears all three of them parading around the corridors like elephants.

Now -- Crowley has a very strict moral code. Strict, that is, for a Demon, not a human or Angel. He knows he shouldn’t let them get away with this, especially with what he knows may lurk around the castle. It’s a massive expanse, with three-headed dogs, secretive halls, angry ghosts. You’d have to be an idiot of a teacher, anyways, to not know about this stuff when they’d all been briefed for it. Crowley and Aziraphale had even helped set up some of the trials behind the door Fluffy was hiding.

Crowley, despite having a strict moral code for a Demon, is still very squiggly about the details.

He collapses onto the floor -- silent, body condensed into its true form -- if a little smaller. Their glances slide off of him like  _ ducks _ off  _ water _ or  _ water  _ off  _ ducks _ , and he grins. He climbs the floor and slithers down the hallway behind them, trailing about and assuring that his ruby red scales don’t flash into sight. 

From what he can gather in their conversation, they’re planning to have a duel with Malfoy. Crowley now supposes he should let them do it since he’s already breaking the rules -- but he has no idea what the oily blonde boy knows in terms of spells. He does feel a bit proud, but Aziraphale would certainly have his head if he let Harry toss his powers around to fight an idiot like Malfoy and leave it hurt. If Crowley was honest, he’d be pissed at himself as well. Malfoy came from a pureblood death eater family. He’d probably know crucio or some right disgusting spells by now, and Crowley wouldn’t take that chance.

They pass by him without a hitch, Hermione faithful even though it looks like she’d rather be anywhere but there, Ron excited, but maybe a little worried, and Harry leading the troupe like Adam did with The Them. They pitter-patter to the trophy room on annoyingly heavy steps, raise their wands and wait for the boy.

Crowley waits behind them. A single spell cast, and he’ll have them all in his office and in detention. He wasn’t an  _ idiot. _

He definitely expects Malfoy to have tricked them, or to chicken, naturally. He only stays as a precaution. 

What he doesn’t expect, of course, is for  _ Argus _ to be sniffing around the halls with a Lucifer of a familiar with him.

He sounds excited at having found some kids to prosecute, and Crowley almost steps in to help them before he realizes they’re already running. He sweeps out of the corridor as a human yet again, scales receding and bright orange eyes glowing just as Argus turns around, startling the man half out of his skin.

“Students!” He shouts, nervous. “You’re a stu-” He does a double-take at Crowley’s glare and ridiculous height. “Professor Crowley?”

“Ah, erm, hello Argus, just doing my rounds.” He leans over and against the wall, gripping it in a pose that probably makes it seem like his bones are completely and utterly broken. “Any…  _ Na _ .” He waves a hand and starts to walk off, dismissive. Then, to add to the effect, he whips around. “There aren’t any _ problems,  _ are there?”

The man gulps nervously, before hardening his look into a giddy frown. “Yes, there are! Mrs. Norris tells me-” and he leans in now, grinning- “-that there are students out of bed, running around the halls!

“Oh?” Crowley raises an eyebrow and stands to his full height, making a few stuttering, gasping noises as if he’s frighteningly confused. “I- I thought I heard some too -- but it only turned out to be your familiar, Argus.” He folds his arms. “There aren’t any students, don’t worry.” And then, he winks. “I’ve ssseen to it.”

“Ah-” Argus nods, wringing his hands and grinning like a demon, but with much less effect than a real one. It’s a weak Demon-stare, all things considered, but strangely realistic for a human. Crowley masks a sneer with a grin. “Then, I’ll just continue my rounds, and you can keep looking as well.”

Crowley nods and points to the man. “That, I think,” he starts, and Argus looks uncertain. He sweats and backs away as Crowley walks closer. “Workss  _ perfectly.” _

_ \--- _

During breakfast the next day, mail time arrives. It’s a Sunday, and a sunny one at that, and the owls flourish under the yellow as they dive and swoop into the hall, delivering everything from tiny letters to huge packages. Black, white, brown, yellow -- all matters of colors surround the room, and a thousand greetings are blown Aziraphale’s way. He speaks back -- in regular human-speech, but they understand him regardless. He sends them away with many  _ thank you _ ’s and  _ hello, stay safe _ ’s! 

But, in the end, Aziraphale is most glad to find Harry’s owl amongst the bunch.

“The package” has arrived safely. It’s wrapped in brown tissue paper and within a long, hopefully inconspicuous package, not lumpy or betraying of shape at all. Harry and Ron both exchange ridiculously excited glances at it and look up to the table where the professors sit. Minerva, Crowley, and Aziraphale all look away as quickly as they can, but the two children see Hedwig between the three adults and grin. Before breakfast is even dismissed, the children run from the room, grinning like the sun. 

It isn’t till later that Aziraphale, Crowley, and Minerva see the boy with his broomstick. As dusk and darkened sies begin to close in, the three climb the stands in the Quidditch field and watch as Harry wanders into the great circular playing area, looking about in wonder. Suddenly, and as if a switch has flipped, he yanks himself onto his broomstick and kicks off. His hair begins to jumps about in the air, his glasses half off, his eyes wild, and he soars, whooping once and starting to round the area. He sees the three spectators and waves, grinning like a madman.

“Hey Potter,” Wood shouts as he marches onto the field, lugging a massive crate at his side. “Get down!”

Harry obeys quickly and lands like a professional, dropping down and holding his broom at his side. Wood starts to talk to him, just out of earshot of the watching crowd, but Harry’s slight blush is enough to inform them all of what the two are discussing. After a moment more, Wood drops to his knees and opens the case, revealing four different balls of varying sizes. He points to a normal, unmoving ball, then to the two struggling ones.

They writhe against their containment, practically screaming to leave their confines. This leads to the crate leaving their side and jumping a few inches away, prompting Wood to put a foot against the lip of the box. He hands Harry a large square baseball bat. Slowly, carefully, revrently -- he opens the latches to one of the violently moving balls. It erupts outwards, flying around to zoom straight into the air. Aziraphale, Crowley and Minerva all track it with their eyes before it flies right back down, straight at Harry.

Before anyone can panic and do someyhing irrational, he goes crosseyed and  _ thwacks  _ the bat into it, sending it hurtling across the field and between the Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff stands. Crowley says something intelligible -- but proud -- as it careens back to the duo on the field and Wood leaps atop of it, hurling the struggling bludger back into its case. 

“How many people  _ die  _ from this,” Crowley asks, grinning. Minerva chuckles.

“There are very few casualties, Anthony, if you’re worried about that.”

“Naw, he assures, pushing his dropping glasses back up the bridge of his nose. “It’s -- well -- you tell me, it’s pretty damn impressive.”

“As long as Harry doesn’t get himself killed,” Aziraphale inserts gently, “I’m sure he’s going to be positively  _ brilliant.” _

\---

With classes, library upkeep, and all of the general  _ mess  _ that is Hogwarts, it’s unsurprising that two months go past and are barely felt by its occupants. To the Angel and Demon, it was clear to see that Harry was finding Hogwarts more and more comfortable by the day. He settled into routines, into friendships, into it all, just as the other two did, finally happy that they’re all learned how to maneuver the castle a  _ bit.  _

On Halloween morning, they all wake up to an especially nice banquet. Pumpkins — courtesy of Hagrid and Crowley — bedeck the halls, floating with carved grins and smarmy glares. Aziraphale has put some up in the library as well, and puts quite a few horror novels on display. Crowley’s classes consist of charmed pumpkin carving, trying not to get killed by them, then promptly smashing a few miss-charmed ones. Aziraphale walks in on one of his lessons, and Crowley spends more time sipping pumpkin juice with the Angel than anything once he arrives. 

They go to the dinner feast together, arm in arm and settling next to each other at the head table. Crowley has donned a stereotypical witches hat, donned in curling green snakes and bright, beautiful flowers. Aziraphale wears a hat that matches — but it’s curved with owls, and dark red flowers sit about its rim. They both sweep about in long, oddly formal robes, before settling down to eat.

A thousand excited bats drift about and fly from the room, making the candlelight stutter as it stands. The feast appears as sudden as ever, settling on bright and golden plates. Murmurs, laughter, soft music erupts, and they begin to eat.

They’re all seeming to be reaching for something when — Professor Quirrel comes racing in, turban eschewed on his head, eyes wide and panicked, sweat pouring from him and soaking his robes in waves. He reaches the middle of the room and everyone stares as his begins to gasp out a warning.

“T- Troll— in the- in the dungeon-“ his eyes start to roll back, and he begins to fall. “Thought you ought to know.” 

His voice ends in a high note, and he collapses onto the ground in a dead faint. The crowds erupt in a raucous uproar, screaming so loud that it takes several firecrackers from Albus’s wand to end it all. 

“Prefects,” Albus rumbled, calmly. He stood at the table and surveyed the chaos with ease. “Lead your houses back to the dormitories immediately!”

In as neat of lines as the prefects can manage, people begin to file out. The cacophony of noise does not die in the slightest. Aziraphale and Crowley watch as Dumbledore hangs his head, settles his wand back into a robe pocket, and walks up to the rest of the teachers.

“Severus.” All he has to do is say the name, and the professor is off, swiftly walking from the room with his wand flicking from his sleeves. “Minerva, Zira, Anthony, please join Quirinus and see to the troll.”

They all nod. As much as Aziraphale and Crowley hate Dumbledore and Severus, it’s clear that the two are looking towards the stone for defense and answers. It’s better to make sure that it doesn’t end up in the wrong hands — and a troll makes a wonderful distraction.

And so, the three teachers make their way off, yanking Quirinus up, the stuttering, quivering man whimpering as he trudged in fright behind them. 

And, that’s when Crowley begins to hear the hissing.

Parseltongue. Scratchy, rough, yet soft as a gem, and snakelike as the speech ever has been. It hisses with a hint of worry desperation, and grows fainter with each moment. The familiar tone of Harry’s speak softly flows through the halls and erupts, before ending abruptly. Crowley stops dead in his tracks and grabs Azirpahale’s arm, eyes darting back and forth. The rest of the party stops as well, looking back to their fellow professor in confusion.

“Anthony, dear?” Aziraphale gently puts an arm to Crowley’s hand. The man doesn’t respond.

Minerva sighs. “Anthony. We cannot-“ 

Abruptly, the demon moves, unhook his hand from Aziraphale’s arm and pulling his wand out. “We’re splitting up,” he says quickly, nodding at Aziraphale. 

Before anyone else in the group can protest, the two start to pace away, seeming to already understand what was non verbally communicated. The halls drip with a hasty prepared fear, waiting for the message to sink in.

“We’ve got to fight it.” Crowley quotes his godson and sighs. “That’s what he said. “We’ve got to fight it,” like he’s not an eleven year old. Why in the bloody hells and blessed heavens would he need to go and  _ fight it?” _

“Hermione wasn’t with them at dinner today,” Azirpahale suggests, hurrying alongside him. “Oh  _ dear,  _ you don’t think she might’ve…”

“They’ve fought recently.” Crowley nods, confirming Aziraphale’s suspicions. “She must’ve gone off beforehand and gotten  _ caught.”  _


	4. Quidditch

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some of the dialogue for this chapter is the same as in the book because Crowley and Aziraphale being professors doesn't change Lee Jordan in the slightest. I love that man.
> 
> Anyways -- onwards, and in Harry's case -- upwards!

As they race through the school, eerie quiet moving in, both begin to grow increasingly uncomfortable. It’s too silent. Silence in a school of all things never signaled something good. So, when they start to hear noises again, they probably should think of it as a blessing.

Except -- it’s screaming. 

“Shit,” Crowley exclaims, pulling off to the side and swerving through a hall, finding that the shadows of a troll have erupted from nearby, along with the horrified shouting. It’s unmistakable. Ron, Harry, Hermione, and a troll are all scraping their throats raw at each other, accompanied by the raucous banging of porcelain and the angry snapping of wood.

“Oh,  _ heaven’s,”  _ Aziraphale exclaims right back, following the demon still. He raises his wand and runs into the bathroom first, ready to greet whatever scene they find. 

(As long as it wasn’t bloody.)

They walk in just in time to see a scene that  _ should’ve  _ led to several deaths, more angry screaming, and a troll with its neck snapped from its shoulders. Instead, the two watch as Ron raises his wand, shouting a charm just as Harry is about to be smashed into the floor, between stone and club.

“WINGARDIUM, LEVIOSA,’ He gasps, for dear life, flishing and swishing his wing about. Crowley and Aziraphale watch in muted horror as Harry leaps off the back of the troll, watching as the club flies above its head. It goes cross-eyed, staring forward in confusion, mutely realizing that he does not have a weapon in his hands anymore, right before it crashes into its head. The troll passes out against the floor with one, final, thump.

It’s silent for a moment. Then:

“You should all be expelled, probably,” grumbles Crowley, kicking a piece of wood away. “Five points to Gryffindor.” He looks at Aziraphale. “Think they kill-”

Aziraphale cuts him off with a snort. “We’ve seen enough trolls in our years to know it’s only stunned, my dear, you should know this.” 

The children in the room start to gape in surprise at the two, as if only just realizing they’re there. 

“Now, come with us, children. You should leave before it wakes up.”

“I-” Ron swallows. “You’re not-”

“Not kicking us out?” Hermione looks around, looking as if she might burst into tears.

“Oh, Heavens no!” Aziraphale puts a hand up and against his chest, keeping his wand hand firmly pointed on the troll, just as Crowley does. “You just defeated a mountain troll at eleven years old!” He looks at Crowley, then back.” In fact, five more points to Gryffindor. It would’ve been ten if you hadn’t been so horribly reckless, but I do believe in second chances.”

Sadly, only a second later, Minerva, Quirrel, Snape and Quirinius come dashing into the room, ruining the excitement and looking about in varying degrees of fright, anger, and annoyance. Quirinius gasps in weakened fright as Harry wipes his wand off on the Troll’s trousers, but stays away with his wide, goggling eyes and shaking limbs. Minerva is the one to step forward and take charge.

“What on Earth-” She cuts off as her eyes meet Crowley and Aziraphale. “Oh- Anthony, Zira? Did you dispose of it?”

Crowley glances back over, then tucks his hands back in his pockets, satisfied. 

“Nah.”

As if to prove Crowley’s point, the troll lets off a deep, pained groan. Quirinius begins to look a rather nasty color of green, and he settles onto one of the toilets, his hand clutched onto his heart. 

“Then who ended it up like..” she sweeps a hand across the air and gestures to it all. “This? The children?”

“Yup,” Crowley tells her, popping the P lazily and leaning back on his heels. Aziraphale echoes him with a nod.

She looks back at the children, enraged. “Why weren’t you in your dorms?” She asks, a little shrilly, eyes squinted in a perceptive glare as the assembled group of first years shrink away from her in worry.

“It wasn’t their fault, Professor McGonagall.” Hermione steps forward, head bowed and hair bouncing in front of her face. She looks a frightened shade of flushed. “Please -- they were looking for me.”

“Miss Granger!”

Hermione manages to look up, nose covered in dusty grey. Wood chips and porcelain sit in her hair. Harry and Ron look about the same -- though Harry’s hands are darkened with dirt and grime from the troll’s back, and Ron’s freckled face red with panic. They all look to be coming off of their high of adrenaline and have begun to tremble.

“I- I thought I could take it,” she admits. Crowley and Aziraphale exchange slightly confused glances, but don’t comment. “You know — because I’ve read all about them. If those two didn’t come looking for me, I would’ve been dead by now. Harry stuck his wand up its nose, and Ron knocked it out with its own club.”

“That’s about what we walked in on, Minerva,” Aziraphale confirms, nodding. The lying seems out of character for the girl, but he stays quiet on the other details that he’s aware of from before the two inhuman beings walked in.

“Well, in that case.” Minerva glares. “ _ Miss. Granger,  _ you foolish girl, what were you thinking?”

They all still look rather shaken. Crowley finds this his moment to cut in again.

“Erm- Minerva, now may  _ not  _ be the time.” The troll lets out an angry moan and starts to shift. 

“Ah-” Aziraphale nods. “Because yes,”

“We already dealt with their punishments,” Crowley finishes, almost.

“Which were quite adequately strict as well, dear.” Aziraphale clasps his hands. “Leave the troll to us, would you? I’m sure you’d like to go and let some stress off.” He looks at all of them. Severus is bleeding heavily from one leg, and glaring daggers at everyone. Quirinius looks like he might pass out. Minerva has practically started to shoot steam from her ears.

“If you’re quite sure,” she wonders. The two nod, sickeningly sweet -- or mischievous, in Crowley’s case. She nods right back. “Mr. Weasley. Mr. Potter. Miss. Granger. Return to your dorms.  _ Now.  _ Your houses are finishing the feast in their dormitories.”

They walk off without responding.

—-

(The troll ends up about a mile from its dwelling, with a rather nasty headache and the putrid smell of a bathroom stuck to its trousers.)

\---

As November entered, destroying the chill of October and replacing it with something much worse, snow began to dust Hogwart's sprawling grounds. White powder spotted the land, along with colorful scarves and newly sprouted shrubbery for the holiday banquet. Kwanzaa, Chanukah and Christmas all sat on the horizon like bright spotlights, accompanied by the smell of candles, evergreens, and  _ food. _

Along with snow and holidays, Quidditch season had begun. While Harry had been practicing, he’d still not gotten a chance to really practice with anyone from his team that wasn’t Wood. The older boy had gotten it into his head that Harry should be a secret weapon of sorts. Crowley had said that was rubbish, seeing as the secret was much farther than just  _ out.  _ Aziraphale had just told him that he’d make a great seeker no matter who he trained with. 

Harry was beginning to doubt that some. Most people had started to tell him they’d be running underneath him with a mattress come flight-time. 

On the day of his game, though, his nerves come to a bitterly annoying crescendo. The food at breakfast looks delicious, and everyone else seems to be greatly enjoying it, but Harry just pushes away a piece of offered toast, Ron shoving it towards him, mouth full.

“Oo nee’ oo eat-” Ron swallows. Hermione pretends to gag. “You’ve gotta eat something. Blimey Harry, you’re gonna pass out and fall off your broom!”

“Don’t jinx it,” Hermione says with a roll of her eyes, before inquiring into the same question as Ron. “But he’s still right. Just a bit of toast?”

“I’m not hungry.” Harry shakes his head. He felt more awful than ever -- he really was sure he’d end up embarrassing himself in front of everyone in about an hour. The whole hall was abuzz with excitement. 

All of a sudden, Snape drifts past. Or -- he would’ve been drifting -- had it not been for a rather nasty limp. He stumbles forward, right leg stiff, and a bulk of bandaged behind his pants leg. After catching Harry staring, he swivels around and stops abruptly in front of them.

“Potter,” he starts, coldly vicious. His lips curl into a snarl. “It’s impolite to stare. Five points from Gryffindor.” His greasy hair sits limply about his shoulders as he walks away. Harry can’t help but feel bad -- he really didn’t mean to stare, it’s just that Snape had been oddly absent from the recent events till he came into the bathroom with a gash in his leg like a claw-slice.

“I hope that limps hurting him,” Ron mutters, taking another bite of his food. 

Harry just sighs and goes back to staring at his toast.

“You need your strength,” Seamus encouraged, an arm thrown over Dean’s shoulder casually. 

“Thanks.” Harry watches as the boy piles more ketchup on his sausage.

\---

The changing room is loud, filled with whooping shouts and excited whistling. Fred and George pat him on the back hard enough to break a rib or two, and Wood mutters anxiously, pulling his hair out while changing into dark red robes. Outside, the rest of the school was packed into the stadium like fish about to be slaughtered. Crowley and Aziraphale sat next to each other at the professor’s stand. Seamus, Dean, Neville, Ron, and Hermione all shoved around to stand by Hagrid, who seemed to be bored around the stuffily silent teachers and promptly shoved his way through to stand by the rest of the Gryffindors. He carries binoculars and an elated, breathless grin, as the rest of their team unfurl banners and flags in support of their team.

Harry starts to walk out of the changing room and tries to ignore his knees shaking together. Wood stands beside him, with Fred and George just behind those two, and Angelina and so on spreading out as an equally important piece of the team, all in semi-neat rows.

“How was your first time playing Quidditch, Wood?” Harry asks, hoping to make himself less anxious.

It backfires miserably. “I fell off the broom halfway through the game. Woke up two days later and could barely remember anything for the next week.” He squints in the blaring sunlight from outdoors, the yellow a stark contrast to the darkened candlelight in the changing rooms. “But you’ll do fine, Harry.”

This, of course, does nothing to help Harry as he walks fro the entryway, listening to a volley of deafening cheers thrown their way as he steps onto the field. Fred and George blow kisses into the wind. Slytherin comes forward, all in green and black, and create a half-circle around the field. 

“Oh!” Aziraphale smiles from his spot in the professor's booth, and points downwards. “There’s Harry, then.”

“Ah- ngk - he looks bad,” Crowley hisses, keeping worry out of his voice before anyone can note it. He does a 180 in demeanor, perhaps not to jinx the ordeal, and shrugs nonchalantly. “He should be fine.” 

“And if he isn’t, he’s always got  _ us,”  _ the Angel reasons simply. He shrugs for the second time.

“Us,” the demon agrees, shrugging for the third. “Oh -- It’sss starting, angel.”

And indeed, it was. Madame Hooch had stepped onto the pitch, blowing a whistle tied about her neck. She turns slowly in a circle, surveying the crowd with her cat-like eyes. 

“Now, I want a nice, fair game,” she says sternly, before narrowing her eyes at a few select players on each team. “All of you.”

Crowley snickers. Aziraphale suppresses a smile at Fred’s indignant glare. The boy didn’t seem like a cheater anyways.

Harry looks up from the crowd and over to the Gryffindor stand. Amidst the other banners rooting for certain players, his eyes are caught by one that reads “Potter for President,” hung by a large group of his friends. His heart skips a beat, and he can’t help but force himself to feel a little braver.

“Mount your Broomsticks, please!”

Harry climbed aboard his broom. His knuckles whiten against the wood, under his gloves.

Madam Hooch gave one last puff of air, sending them off with a hissing noise from her whistle. Fifteen broomsticks rose. The Quaffle flies overhead. They were off. 

Lee Jordan -- a third year, and a tricky one that Crowley had immediately begun to like -- starts to commentate as soon as the quaffle is taken.

“"And the Quaffle is taken immediately by Angelina Johnson of Gryffindor -- what an excellent Chaser that girl is, and rather attractive, too--"

Minerva looks like she’d like to take the mic from him, and so she shouts out- “JORDAN!”

“Sorry professor,” the boy says, not sorry in the slightest. 

Crowley chuckles, shoving his hands into his pockets. It was bloody cold. 

(Snakes did  _ not  _ like the cold, and neither did human corporations.)

"And she's really belting along up there, a neat pass to Alicia Spinnet, a good find of Oliver Wood's, last year only a reserve -- back to Johnson and -- no, the Slytherins have taken the Quaffle, Slytherin Captain Marcus Flint gains the Quaffle and off he goes -- Flint flying like an eagle up there -- he's going to sc --” Lee starts to sound a little panicked.

“No, stopped by an excellent move by Gryffindor Keeper Wood and the Gryffindors take the Quaffle -- that's Chaser Katie Bell of Gryffindor there, nice dive around Flint, off up the field and -- OUCH -- that must have hurt, hit in the back of the head by a Bludger -- Quaffle taken by the Slytherins -- that's Adrian Pucey speeding off toward the goalposts, but he's blocked by a second Bludger -- sent his way by Fred or George Weasley, can't tell which -- nice play by the Gryffindor Beater, anyway, and Johnson back in possession of the Quaffle, a clear field ahead and off she goes -- she's really flying -- dodges a speeding Bludger -- the goalposts are ahead -- come on, now, Angelina -- Keeper Bletchley dives -- misses --”

A huge intake of air, then--

“GRYFFINDORS SCORE!"

The crowds of Gryffindor’s begin to howl and cheer, jeering mockingly at the disgruntled crowds of Slytherin. Crowley, on reflex, almost starts clapping. 

“Any of you see th’ snitch?” Hagrid scans the crowd. Ron shakes his head and sighs.

“Nope,” he says, and he’s a little sad about it. “Harry hasn’t had much to do yet.” He points to the sky, where the boy waves back and forth on his broom in midair, scanning the area methodically.

“Kept outta trouble.” Hagrid nods, satisfied. “That’s something, innit?”

The angry: “Slytherin in possession” from Jordan snaps them from their conversation. The quaffle races closer and closer towards the goalposts, and it’s as if the whole entirety of Gryffindor leans forward at once. 

“Chaser Pucey ducks two Bludgers, two Weasleys, and Chaser Bell, and speeds toward the -- wait a moment -- was that the Snitch?"

Adrian Pucey drops the quaffle in stunned surprise as a flash of gold just barely brushes his ear. 

But, it’s not too fast for Harry. He dives, streaking down — down — down from his spot perched in the heavens. Slytherin seeker Terrence Higgs goes riding neck and neck with the boy, spotting the flitting ball and gunning for it. Harry was just faster than the other boy -- he could see the snitch -- it was just in reach --

Marcus Flint  _ slams  _ into Harry, and he nearly falls off his broom, careening out of the way. The snitch escapes to the noise of angry Gryffindors calling “FOUL!” All through the stands. Crowley and Aziraphale both half-stand, the demon shouting something unintelligible, and the Angel glaring like he could go full Gabriel and smite the other boy. 

While Madam Hooch discusses something with Flint and calls a free throw for the Gryffindor, the snitch escapes once again, dropping into the sky in a magnetic blur. Dean calls wildly down about red cards, while everyone else stares at him in mild confusion. On the other side of the ring of stands, Jordan seemed to be having a spot of trouble trying to stay impartial.

"So -- after that obvious and disgusting bit of cheating--"

_ "Jordan!"  _ growls Professor McGonagall, though she isn’t as adamant as before.

"I mean, after that open and revolting foul. . . "

"Jordan, I'm warning you--"

"All right, all right.” Jordan grumbles for a moment, then continues as the game picks back up. “Flint nearly kills the Gryffindor Seeker, which could happen to anyone, I'm sure, so a penalty to Gryffindor, taken by Spinner, who puts it away, no trouble, and we continue to play, Gryffindor still in possession. "

A bludger goes breakneck fast past Harry’s head. It makes a noise like a whip crack as it slams past and away as Fred hits it.

And that is when things start to go wrong.

For only a split second at first, Harry’s broom lurches suddenly to the left, and he thinks he’s going to fall off. His knuckles tighten against the broom. Sweat drips off his bow, and he lets out a suppressed gasp for air. That had never happened.

And it shouldn’t ever happen again -- is what Harry assumes -- right as it starts to buck him off again. He was pretty sure that that wasn’t supposed to happen.

Down in the stands, Aziraphale squints upwards and points at his godson, whose broom has begun to toss him around. It zig-zags across the stage and Harry really begins to look as if he might fall.

“Crowley?” He looks over. “Err- That’s… Not supposed to happen. Is it.”

Crowley looks to where Aziraphale had pointed and narrows his eyes behind his glasses. “No, It’s not,” he mutters, still watching. “Maybe he’s just… bored?’

“Bored.” Aziraphale raises an eyebrow. “Really, Crowley?”

People around the stadium have begun to notice as well. They point to the boy -- gasping, laughing. Harry doesn’t seem to be gaining any more control, and Crowley curses as the boy slips down. Both the Angel and Demon stand, fully prepared to fly into the middle and save him, when Harry falls off completely, bucked to the side. He grabs the stick now and hangs on for dear life by one hand as it throws him. By now, the entire crowd has acknowledged the oddity -- even some of the players take pause. 

“Oh, shit,” Crowley grumbles, before stepping forward, staring at his Godson, and clicking his fingers together in a quick snap

The broom is righted. Harry climbs back on, still confused. The stadium (on Gryfindoor’s side,) sighs collectively. Crowley begins to amass a few strange looks -- but he regards that with cool indifference, sitting back in his seat with Aziraphale and nodding, content. 

“Crowley-” Aziraphale scoffs. “Dear, you have a wand for a  _ reason!”  _

“Eh? Can’t wizards like..” He waves a hand. “Do that.” his face wrinkles into an emotion like a shrug. “Wandless magic... And, whatever else?”

“Well, yes, but it’s very rare, and you should already know that.” Aziraphale scoffs at himself, before smiling a little. “Although, Almighty knows I was about to do the same thing.”

Harry starts to flit about the area like an anxious hummingbird, diving down and twisting in elegant circles.

“They’ve found it again!” Jordan whoops in excitement. “To the left, then down -- no, to the right and down and then to the left again and oo - careful of the bludger -- Terrence buggers off -- Oh! No, he’s back, and they’re neck and neck!’

The crowd goes completely silent as Harry and Terrence come to a massive halt in the far off in the skyward distance, before careening madly downwards, a wicked chase for a fluttering, shining gold. They move at a 90-degree angle, Terrence grinning with bloodlust and Harry’s chin bumping his broom.

It’s too far. Terrence dives out of the tail spinning, suicidal drop, and Harry -- Harry reaches for the snitch and very nearly smashes into the ground.

He levels out, a mere foot or two from the grass. The snitch is almost there, but it’s clear that he isn’t fast enough -- he’s only a foot away, then inches --

And Harry lets go of the broom.

His hands, shaky, lift into the air, and he hugs the broom with his things before he lifts his legs as well, putting a single, trembling foot against the wood of his broom, lips pursed tightly in concentration. He almost has it — 

He falls off.

He hits the frozen grass with a few soggy thumps, but the snitch is nowhere to be seen. Harry rights himself, standing as quick as anything and looking around with wide eyes, hands crawling up to his throat and mouth. Madame Pomfrey sighs behind Crowley and Aziraphale as Harry begins to choke. 

Her sighs are quickly taken aback by the sight of the snitch ripping itself from his mouth in a vomiting cough, landing in his hands. 

\---

“We think it was Snape,” Ron explains to the wizened and slightly unqualified counsel of Crowley, Aziraphale, and Rubeus, sitting in the groundskeeper’s hut and sipping tea. “Hermione and I saw him.” He looks at Harry. “He was cursing your broomstick, muttering, he wouldn’t take his bloody eyes off’o’ya.”

“No, it wasn’t.” Crowley sneers. “Snape is… a shitty guy, but he’s not Lord bloody Voldemort.” He splays his arms out. “He’s not Lucifer!”

“Even though Snape is deeply unpleasant to be around,” Aziraphale responds, a bit more eloquent through the haze of a nice whiskey Rubeus had allowed the two. “He won’t harm you, Harry.”

“‘S all rubbish.” Rubeus sips more tea. “Why would Snape want to do that, anyway?”

All three students look at each other, then back at Rubeus.

“We found something out about Snape,” Harry admits, nervous, but determined. “He tried to get past that three-headed dog on Halloween. It bit him. We think he was trying to steal whatever it's guarding. "

At this, Crowley barks out a heady laugh.

“Harry, kid, I’ve gotta love you, but not  _ quite  _ the conclusion to draw with grease-demon.” He drinks some more, and it continues to reflect in his intensive slouch. “He’s one of the wankers protecting the thingy!”

“I- Crowley, dear,” Aziraphale puts a hand on Crowley’s arm, “We- we weren’t supposed to tell them that, were we?”

“No,” Rubeus admits for the demon. “No, ‘e shouldn’t ‘ave.”

“Oh, lighten up, Rubeus,” Crowley half-groans, grimacing as he talks. “Albus may be  _ smart,  _ but he’s--” he waves his hands about. “He isn’t ineffable. His plan is a little obvious. The three most trouble-making first years deserve to know where  _ not _ to go.”

“But how do they know about Fluffy?” Rubeus asks, visibly upset. He’d grown quite attached to the Cerberus-like dog. It was much kinder than the one Satan used to keep around.

“Fluffy?” Ron looks at the man in disbelief. “You named it Fluffy?”

“Yes, ‘e’s fluffy. I got him off a Greek chap -- he’s cute. Either way-“ he points at the three severely- “whatever down there is between Professor Dumbledore and Nicholas Flammel.”

_ “Nicholas Flammel? Cute?”  _ Hermione even looks confused. 

“Rubeus…”

“Hagrid,” Harry begins, ending the confusing stream of chatter. “But — he was guarding something, wasn’t he?”

“Ah, I do believe this is where we cross the line,” Aziraphale says warningly. " You don’t need to know anything other than to  _ not go back.” _


	5. Christmas

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am.. a little sorry. This chapter is late, kind of short, and not super action-packed or anything. I've been super busy with a lot of work, and I'm altogether having some issues right now, so updating is a little hard. But! I am working! And,I'm still excited to keep going on this story, because it's fun to write and hear what ya'll think!
> 
> Enjoy!

The holidays were unquestionably coming now. At the beginning of December, Hogwarts found itself covered in a layer of snow so thick that all outdoor classes were forced indoors, then promptly canceled. The lake froze solid, leaving the leviathan inside bored and frighteningly restless. Fred and George had begun to enchant and sell snowballs that would bounce off the back of Quirinius’s turban, or any other teacher’s head and hat. Whatever owls managed to cross over the grounds had to be nursed back to help by Hagrid -- and Aziraphale did the best he could to help as well.

The common rooms and the Great hall were spread with viciously cheerful fires and candles, but that didn’t spare anyone from the intolerable cold of the halls and the dungeons. That, unfortunately, included Crowley -- who had taken to ditching his robes forever -- replacing them with various jackets and black leather gloves, which still didn’t do much in terms of helping him to fix his inherent shiver. 

When Crowley found himself back in his classes outside, he was more than a little annoyed. One misty morning where the clouds hung heavily over the visor of the school and consumed the dreary landscape, Aziraphale decided he’d make his way to the greenhouses to join the demon. It was less about inspecting him employing torture techniques on students, and more out of sheer curiosity.

This, of course, goes oddly sideways, when the Angel enters and finds that the Demon is in the middle of glaring at a miserable group of third years. They’re learning about how to protect plants from the cold -- but it turns out that one of them has just exploded one of Crowley’s plants into a putrid-smelling green flame. The girl in question -- a Slytherin -- is an odd shade of pink, and she averts her eyes each time Crowley mentions her slip of hand in his lesson.

“Oh!” Aziraphale clasps his hands in embarrassment, then waves awkwardly. “My apologies, Anthony, and to you, students. I just meant to grab a bit of-”

“It’s fine, Angel.” Crowley interrupts. He waves a flippant hand and whirls back about to face his students again. His mouth shudders into a grimace, He looks like he might break the table he’s clutching beneath him It seems he’s making a sorry attempt to hide the shivering in his hands. “Do whatever you want.”

He returns to talking as Aziraphale picks a single leaf of the plant he’d needed, then stalls and watches the class instead of returning to his work. 

“Now, if _sssomeone_ could tell me why what Miss. Efter did wrong,” he hisses, “That would be _great.”_

A hesitant hand is raised. 

“Ah. Keeley.” Crowley nods. “Put that Slytherin cunning to use, please, I could use a change of pace.”

A few people laugh around the room. Chrissie Efter, no longer the only one subject to Mr. Crowley’s occasional-and-usually-harmless wrath, sighs and sets her scorched pot onto the table.

“No you, sir, with all due respect.” 

Crowley barks out a laugh at Anderson Keeley’s snark. Still, he prompts for him to continue. Fred high-fives the boy. 

“But- erm- she said it like…” He mouths it out to himself, then sets his wand down. “Terra Conservatome, not Terra Conservationem.”

Crowley points to his student with a reanimated grin. “Five points to Slytherin for knowing how to annunciate!”

The crowd ripples with laughter once again. Crowley’s smile droops into a faux-glare and they fall quickly silent. 

“But honestly, Efter, for the love of _Satan,_ just _ask_ me how to _say it._ You’re all insufferable. Madam Pomfrey doesn’t want you in her ward for any reason -- whether you explode yourselves, or I do it.”

A clap of thunder erupts outside. “Now! You’re all dismissed! Stop torturing my plants -- that’s my job.” They stare at him for a moment. 

“Get out!”

He thumps a hand on the table, and it echoes loudly, blending in with the laughter of his students. Aziraphale doesn’t even try to suppress his smile. 

Once the room is cleaned out, he makes his way over to Crowley, who has begun to mutter in annoyance at the half-burnt fern Chrissie Efter had been trying to help. With a little hissing noise and a snap, it rises, no longer blackened, and he sets it on a windowsill after casting the proper enchantment. “This is only till spring,” he says, looking around at the plants. They seem to shake at his sudden vigor. “So don’t you dare start.. growing funny."

“You ought to be nicer to them, _really_ Crowley,” Aziraphale muses, stroking the leaf of a massive green fern growing next to him. It seems to rise in high spirits at the praise. Aziraphale smiles encouragingly at it.

“Stop being so bloody nice to m’ plants, Angel,” Crowley complains, sauntering over and shoving his hands deep into his pockets. “‘Sss- damnit -- too cold.”

Aziraphale regards him with a smile that seems to say “I told you so,” but he stays polite, and doesn’t actually say it. Instead, he shows it. 

He picks up the blue and black Ravenclaw scarf he’d kept draped over his shoulders and moves up to Crowley, winding it gently over the demon’s own form. Crowley stops in his tracks and stares, eyes wide and mouth half-open in surprise. When Aziraphale steps away, he recomposes himself. 

(Aziraphale catches him brushing his hands over the fabric anyways, smiling to himself when he thinks the Angel isn't looking.)

“Thanks,” he says, feigning absolute boredom and holding an arm out. 

“No problem at all, dear,” Aziraphale says, taking the arm. 

“Should we get going?” 

“Certainly.”

They start to walk out of the greenhouse together. Snow drapes about their legs, freshly cleared paths not enough as they wander a twisting route to the castle. Water begins to soak through their socks and the edges of their pants. 

“The snow is bloody freezing.”

Aziraphale chuckles, but his own irritation is not lost in the noise. Even Angel’s— the normal, unbastardly ones— became irritated. Wet socks did not discriminate. 

“Yes, Crowley. I do believe that’s how snow works.”

“Stop being so... “ Crowley loses his words for a moment as he kicks through the snow. “Irritatingly knowledgeable, Angel.”

“If you keep calling me angel, people may start to get ideas, Crowley. It is a human pet name.”

“I know. Demons don’t care about opinions.”

“Yes, well, you’re not all..” Aziraphale gestures in front of himself with one hand, wildly. “You’re not completely a blasphemous demon. Are Demons blasphemous?”

“I guess we are,” Crowley muses right back. “And even if I’m -- Even if I’m _not_ the most bastardly Demon out there, I’m still a bastard. You’re not all Angel either, ngk?”

“I-” 

Aziraphale starts to take offense, then rethinks it. It would be a little hypocritical. 

“Maybe we’re both a little off. We are on our own side, after all.”

—-

Later that night, they meet with Harry and his friends within Rubeus’s hut, Crowley shivering so harshly he can barely hold his tea. Aziraphale takes pity on him -- if it wasn’t for his true snake form, then the cold wouldn’t affect him so much -- and he lights Rubeus’s fireplace with a snap of his fingers.

Thanksss,” the demon says, nodding and uncurling, just a bit. Rubeus rubs his hands together and breathes against them to warm the frozen and exposed fingertips peaking up from his fingerless gloves. Crowley scowls at the room in disdain. “Rubeus, why does Albus let you like in such a tiny shack?”

“I’m prefec’ly alright with it,” Rubeus defends. “Dumbledore is gracious to let me stay anywhere on th’ grounds.”

“No, he’s not,” Aziraphale tells him primly.

“It is strange,” Hermione begins, wrinkling her face into a frown. “You’re just as -- if not more important than the professors.” She looks at the other two. “No offense to either of you, I mean-”

“It’s all tickety boo, dear,” Aziraphale soothes. “We both agree. Rubeus, you really ought to get. better treatment.”

“Well, I know that none of you came here just to talk about me.” Rubeus, starting to look rather annoyed, drunks from his tea.

Deciding that angering one of their few friends is a reckless decision, Crowley takes action and changes the subject of the discourse he’d started. 

“Well - anyways - Hermione, Ron, you two going home this year?”

Ron shakes his head. “Mum and dad are taking a visit to Romania.”

Hermione goes in the opposite direction. “My parents celebrate Christmas. We aren’t religious, but it’s nice, so I’ll be heading home to them.” 

Harry, who hadn’t even needed to answer, looks visibly uncomfortable and ducks his head away, hoping to hide his expression. It fails, of course. 

“Harry,” Crowley demands, sudden and a little vicious. The nonviolent vicious, of course. “Why are y’... so quiet?”

“I dunno.” Harry shrugs. “Malfoy was being a git in class. Talking about how I don’t have a family to go home to this Christmas.”

“That’s rubbish.” Crowley folds his hands against his knee and sneers. “You’ve got _family._ Ngk — me and ‘Ziraphale are both a place to go home to, even if we’re not blood.”

“And I see you as family,” Harry admits softly. He tugs at the frayed edges of his pants pocket, and looks back up with a pensive look. “It’s just… I dunno.”

“Malfoy’s parents made him into a bloody wan-“

“What-“ Aziraphale shoots a look at Ron “Ron means, is that you shouldn’t listen to Malfoy. You’re always allowed to go back home for the holidays. If you’d want to. You’re not going back to _them."_

“Them.” Ron wrinkles his nose at the mention of the Dursley’s. They were— needless to say— a sour subject for everyone involved. “Yeah, Harry, you’ve got two bloody ridiculous folks -- no offense professors -- for y’ godfathers.” He shrugs. “Plus, if you stay, I won’t be so _bored_ . There’s only so much of Lavender's obsessive whining a man can _deal with!”_

“You’re hardly a man, Ron,” Hermione reminds the boy, leveling him with a look. “And besides -- I’m pretty sure Lavender goes home to her family anyways.”

“Does she?” He shrugs. “Not soon enough.”

“Ronald, really?” Aziraphale frowns. “A point from Gryffindor. Don’t be rude.” He glances at Crowley as if checking for an offended expression. “Don’t be rude _excessively_.”

They set up a game of wizard chess after Crowley’s indignant arguing about the semantics of what makings rudeness excessive ends. Ron teaches Harry how to play while the rest of them -- minus Hermione, who was looking for a very specific “F name” in a book -- watched in muted fascination as the little pieces smashed and destroyed each other. 

(Crowley and Aziraphale soon realize that whoever tries to get to the Stone below Fluffy’s paws had better be a veritable chess genius. Minerva had made the puzzle _exceedingly_ hard.) 

On Christmas eve, Harry goes to sleep expecting him to awaken with no presents. Whether he had Aziraphale and Crowley looking over him as a Demon and Angel respectively now -- it didn’t matter. The Dursley’s had always given him things like old shoes, or shoelaces, or a single, musty, unwashed sock. On one particularly cold year, they’d given him a paperclip. He’d been four.

So, when he awakens in the morning and finds a sizable amount of gifts at the foot of his bed, he is -- needless to say -- absolutely surprised. 

A few of those presents had been brought about by the two inhuman beings he called guardians. Back in Aziraphale’s flat, where Crowley has taken up near-permanent residence, they sit by the fire and chat. Chatting was always fairly easy for the two, and that rule goes unbroken as they discuss the topic of their godsons and the presents they’d given a strange amount of people this year.

“Think he’ll like it?” Crowley asks.

“I think he’ll love both,” Aziraphale responds, turning a page in his book. 

Rubeus had collaborated on a gift with the two. With their combined manpower, they’d compiled a massive scrapbook. Photos, writings, letters, and all manners of other things, all of them from James and Lily Potter. Even if Crowley had never met them, he was more than happy to help the group locate long-buried, long-lost, or half-destroyed records of Harry’s parents.

Individually, Aziraphale had gotten him a pair of glasses charmed to never grow foggy or wet, and a book on famous Quidditch players all around the world. Crowley had gotten him a handwritten booklet of all of the (relatively) harmless hexes him and Anathema could find, and a quill with a hard, wooden tip instead of feathers, that could write letters perfectly invisible to anyone but those who the writer really wanted to see it. They’d also given him lots of candy -- just as they’d given to Warlock, The Them, Ron, and Hermione.

Naturally, as it was their first Christmas to have with Harry, they were nervous about how he would feel about the gifts. It was simply too awkward to sit in the room with Ron and Harry and wait till they woke up. So, after depositing their gifts, they’d left, walking through Hogsmeade together. They usually preferred to just miracle themselves there, especially with Crowley’s general hatred of the cold, but they’d picked up two cups of nice hot cocoa from the breakfast banquet and were both feeling like sightseeing. 

The town was nearly empty, save for the voices of some children engaging in snowball fights. Parents call for them to return inside, or come and fight alongside their kids. Bartenders lock their shops and cross into their home early in the afternoon. It’s peaceful, as if the blanketing of snow has created a smooth layer above the traffic of humanity. 

Even so, they sit down in Aziraphale’s flat in London as soon as they enter the apartment complex. It’s furiously warm, yet it feels even warmer as they settle into their seats and enjoy the familiar, empty store. They’re a bright harmony of two very different yet completely similar essences and they’ve always worked together well.

“Speaking of -” Crowley sits up, levering himself against the back of the couch he’s lounging on. “Speaking of gifts, Angel, I- ngk- _may_ have gotten you something.”

Aziraphale, who happened to adore the traditions of giving or accepting gifts, smiles and sets his cocoa down. “Well, Crowley, I may have gotten you something as well,” he replies, sounding very pleased with himself.

“‘S a bit strange, isn’t it,” Crowley muses. “An Angel and a Demon, celebrating Christmas together and whatnot.”

“Yes, well, we did both know Jesus well, dear.” Aziraphale pulls a neatly wrapped package from a coffee table. It had not been there a moment before. “You first?”

“Ah- yes, I suppose.” 

Crowley, not one to care about flashy hidden magic like Aziraphale’s appearing act, simply snaps, and the gift appears in his other hand. It’s a book. Small, aged, brown leather and spine broken with the years. Despite what Aziraphale can tell have been extreme efforts to keep the book in good shape, it seems that age has begun to catch up with it.

“I know you loved Shakespeare, no matter how gloomy he was.” He holds the book out. “All of these have been reprinted, _obviously,_ but -- err -- it’s still his. He wrote these. Most of them are barely legible, but he let me have a few as a sort of thanks, and I bound them-"

Aziraphale takes the booklet with bright, starlit eyes and an irrepressible grin. He begins to search through the pages as Crowley falls silent, tapping his knee with a finger as he watches the Angel skim through it and grow even more exuberant. 

“Crowley dear,” he starts, sounding and appearing as overjoyed as a painted cherub. He’s a little startled and breathless. “This is simply amazing! Are you sure you didn’t have to visit him in the afterlife to find these?”

“I’m the tempter. Angel, he gave them to me with open hands.”

“This-”

He sets the book down with quite a bit of care. “This is fantastic, dear boy.” His eyes catch on his own present to Crowley. “Oh! Yes! I almost forgot.” A self-deprecating chuckle, and he picks the gift up. 

“I’m afraid this may… pale in comparison to your gift, really, but I didn’t expect either of us to do a real gift-giving anything… anything. This is our first year through a holiday as -- safely -- friends.”

Crowley nods. ‘Anything ‘s fine Angel. I’m already saying you shouldn’t have -- ‘cause you really shouldn’t have.”

“Nonsense. I just wanted to do something casual.” He hands the box over and smiles nervously. “Oh- I do hope you like it.”

Crowley silently takes the gift. He looks a little uncomfortable as he tears the paper off, as if worried it will burst into flames, or into holy water, but he just sets it on the couch, continuing silently. When he does get it open, it’s just a small box. It’s black, with an unassuming lid, and no designs. The only thing out of place is a small green and red bow sitting atop of it, stuck there by tape and shimmering lightly in the glow. He smiles at it, stabs a finger into it, then pulls it off and sets it on his knee like a garnish before pulling the lid off of the box.

It’s a pair of gloves, sitting crossed over in an x on top of a scarf. They’re black, and a silky texture that runs over Crowley’s hands like water as he pulls them out. The scarf is knitted, the same material as the Hogwarts houses scarves. It’s black, with dark red tassels on either end, but not flashy or bright. He slips the gloves on and tucks the scarf around his shoulders, face tucked away until he looks up and Aziraphalle sees that he is grinning like a madman.

“It’s not much…”

“Aziraphale.” Crowley levels him with a raised eyebrow and that same fanged smile. He leans back on the couch and pulls his sunglasses off, revealing bright eyes filled with happiness. He looks absolutely delighted. “Shudup. This is-“ he runs a gloved hand over the scarf. “Bloody brilliant.”

“Oh, _dear,_ I’m so glad you liked it,” Aziraphale says, straightening up proudly. “They just seemed very… well, very you, and you’re always so cold, and Angels are supposed to help all of Her creatures…. oh, I’m just glad you like them.” He clasps his hands together and smiles.

—-

That night, at the banquet, there are so few students there that Crowley and Aziraphale ditch the near-empty professor’s table and sit with Harry and Ron. It’s silent through the hall. 

“Thank you,” Harry says breathlessly when they first come over. Ron, through a mouthful of candy given to him by the two godfathers, tries to thank them as well with a very low rate of success.

“Of course, Harry!” Aziraphale beams at him and starts to eat a bit of roast ham. 

“Did you-” Ron points at them. “Give him the bloody invisibility cloak?” He eats some more. “I’s wicke’!”

Crowley and Aziraphale both grow _very_ still _very_ suddenly. If the two students didn’t know any better, they’d think the beings had just seen a ghost.. In fact, the Boody Baron had passed behind Harry and Ron as they spoke, but as Ethereal and Occult beings, he didn’t bother them much. No- it’s the subject of The Deathly Hallows resurgence that surprises them. Azrael had been in quite a bit of trouble with Her when they’d made them, and as the only sibling Crowley ever saw anymore, he’d gotten a full-on ranting Angel of Death at the injustice of it. It would’ve been funnier, had Crowley not been asleep at the time.

“Ah- no.”

“No.” Crowley shakes his head. “Definitely-”

“Definitely did not,” Aziraphale finishes. “Pudding?”

Ron nods, and the conversation thankfully becomes much less confusing.

Even with that particularly strange discussion being the one just ended, Crowley is clearly dissatisfied with the silence after a few more moments of chewing noises and the scuffing of kicking feet. Ever bored with silence, he suddenly finds himself inclined to jump on top of the table and start shouting.

“HEY!” He shouts, still-gloved hands cupped around his mouth. His hair is pulled into a ponytail, and his scarf is draped around his neck, but he’s only wearing something akin to pajamas. Most of the people in the room are, save for those who gave up and came in straight pajamas instead of making any effort. “GET OVER HERE!”

With that, he drops back down, falling from a seated position on the table then back down to the bench. The students around look a little wary, or confused, or ever angry.

Still, it seems that some are just as dissatisfied with a silent Christmas banquet as Crowley is. Soon a small crowd of the Gryfindoors becomes larger, and many are congregated together. The Ravenclaws seem to swarm around Aziraphale, ignoring Crowley and everyone else at first. The same happens with the Slytherins and Hufflepuffs, who center themselves around Crowley, leaving the Gryffindors a little cramped. It’s a problem for a moment, before Crowley just leaps up onto the table, shoving his food away and sitting on the wood, feet dangling. Some of the students join him, and everyone starts to mingle. Slytherin and Gryffindor. Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff. All of them. The two professors end up taking great satisfaction in seeing Albus’s open, gaping and confused mouth. Severus looks wildly irritated, which only adds to the fun. Minerva and Hagrid, being some of the only other staff there, actually join the huge congregation of groups, leading to even more confusion from the students. Apparently, as Crowley and Aziraphale were realizing, inter-house relationships were sorely lacking.

It was a pity they were, as this single night was amazing. 

Rubeus and Minerva get more and drunk together, till he presses a huge kiss to her cheek. Minerva _giggled._ Her mouse-adorned hat was _askew,_ and she seems to be trying to “party.” A Slytherin prefect shares a cracker with a Gryffindor first year. Party favors exploded into mice, and hats, one of which is a bright pink top hat -- that Crowley wears for the rest of the night. Aziraphale wears a matching one, a horrible lime green that clashes with his tartan so horribly he’s almost tempted to remove the blessed thing. Harry and Ron hold hands and cheer as the cracker they’ve been given explodes into a cloud of bright blue smoke that engulfs half the table, leading to a bit of friendly terrified screaming. Five bright white mice come flying from the end, and promptly disintegrate, turning into a bouquet of bright red flowers.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Rip my brain cells! I had to split this chapter into two parts, so if anyone remembers the books well enough you'll know some Mirror of Erised stuff is coming up. 
> 
> Also -- I just want to mention -- Kwanzaa and Hannukah do happen in this fic! I mentioned it in the last chapter, I know, and I just wanted to say I only actually wrote about Christmas's specific date because A) Both Hannukah and Kwanzaa finish before or start after Christmas most of the time as far as I can tell, and B) I am not Jewish or African/African-American, but I do know a lot about Christmas because it is what my family celebrates, and is sadly the most marketed out of the three holidays. I don't fully trust myself to write about the others. C) No one in the main character group I'm writing celebrates either of those holidays and so I didn't feel the need to dedicate a chapter to each holiday time.


	6. The Mirror of Erised

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry that this chapter is a bit shorter. I thought the ending it has know suits it more than the beginning of another chapter.

Aziraphale and Crowley, as fate (or She) apparently decrees, end up on the same night watch shift one night after another. They were essentially the only two willing to do it, but neither really minded. Aziraphale said something about saving some other poor soul from the task, while Crowley said he was tempting someone into sloth-iness by taking up their job. Neither, it seemed, had quite broken the habit of making excuses to speak to each other. 

Seeing as this was only a day after Christmas, they’d spent their way discouraging -- and In Crowley’s case -- cheering on Fred and George as they pelted the other teachers with snowballs, talking to Harry about the upcoming schooltime, and worrying about one very peculiar gift that they had  _ not  _ gotten him.

“Azrael, yknow,” Crowley explains in a hushed voice the moment they link arms, a quick greeting. “They -- they went down here, and made a deal-”

“The Deathly Hallows,” Aziraphale finishes, before nodding and going a pace quicker than the demon as he often did when focused on his own thoughts. Crowley has to hurry to keep up with him. “I’ve seen the resurrection stone. God was a right bit angry about that one.” He frowns. “Azrael really shouldn’t have done it. They’re lucky she doesn’t really fall anyone anymore.’

Crowley scoffs. “Yeah, well, all it took back in my day was a few questions. I didn’t even _ like _ Lucy. He’s not  _ actually  _ very alluring.” 

“I always liked Raphael more,” Aziraphale says offhandedly. Crowley just sniffs and lets out a vaguely biting puff of air. They walk on. Silently.

Until -- a bloodcurdling scream splits the atoms of the air and pushes their hair up on its ends. They toss all other conversation away in favor of running after the noise. They nearly push Filch over in their hurry, but Aziraphale is distracted, more worried about the miserable sounding book moaning and shouting and babbling from within his precious library.

“Somebody’s been in the libraries restricted section,” the man tells them as they get further and further away from him, rubbing his hands together and sounding incredibly proud with himself until he realizes he’s been left alone. He chases after the two in an irritated huff.

“The restricted section?” Crowley frowns and looks to the Angel.

“Well, they can’t be far.” Aziraphale walks into the library briskly, gaze sweeping about. “We can catch them.”

(Despite being an Angel, he did not enjoy getting his students in trouble and usually tried to avoid it. But -- when it came to his library -- Aziraphale was much more protective than usual.)

“I’m going off to search,” Crowley tells him, and Filch as well as he finally enters the room. Aziraphale nods distractedly and the Demon walks down the halls.

It takes him a moment, but he catches a bizarre, almost familiar scent. It rasps over his tongue and nose, hints of Angelic nature and the silvery gold buildings of heaven, along with a tang of humanities must, like rotting fabric and the Gryffindor common room. He has a sneaking suspicion that the person out of bed might be quite a bit more familiar than he’d expected. He sweeps through the area and searches for Harry, only stopping when his eyes catch on a door off to the side, barely ajar.

When he enters the room, it appears to be an unused classroom. Even if he’d explored the bulk of the school, this room was still unfamiliar to him. Desks, chairs, covered in sheets, are arranged around the room like inanimate corpses. Dusty white fabrics lather the walls and his surroundings, hiding lumpy parcels of something unknown. He sees a boy shaped indent in the air -- and damn, it really is Harry -- and decides that his atoms are going to be unseen now.

He begins to go unnoticed. It only takes a moment of dissatisfaction for him to begin inspecting the room, pacing around and brushing his fingers deftly to the white sheeting. They look like ghosts, sent here to live forever in a desolate, empty place. His hands find new homes in his pockets, and aces around the room, looking silently about. He’s almost about to leave -- Harry could handle himself with the cloak -- when he stops in his tracks -- eyes catching on something painfully familiar propped up against the wall in front of Harry.

A luxurious golden mirror. Edges gilded with gold, glass polished and flawless. It stands on two embellished claw feet. An inscription edged into the top feels like the final part of a puzzle-like part of his memories that he hadn’t thought of for a very long time.

(Crowley was The Temper. The Tempter of souls, with gilded tongue and silver eyes. Crowley knew vanity was a form of provocation, but passion and desire went much deeper. Crowley never did much in terms of evil either way.)

(The mirror of Erised was an exception.)

He walks from the room like a coward, nausea rising in his gut, steps jerky. It’s almost an impulse — leave the mistake — just like anyone else might -- just like She might. Some greater worry fills him for a moment and he stops on unsteady steps, trailing off in the hallways and weighing the option of re-entering the room and pulling his Godson away. He curses and continues walking away, faster, surer now.

As he walks back into the library, Aziraphale turned to greet him. “See anyone?” He looks Crowley up and down and raises an eyebrow, meeting his eyes with a questioning gaze.“You look… tense."

“Ah-“ he loosens his stance and shoves his hands deep into the fabric of his pockets. “Walk with me, ‘Ziraphale. I found something that shouldn’t be here.”

Filch, thankfully, is long gone, and Crowley pulls Aziraphale out of the library. He’s half tempted to just show the Angel the mirror, but thinks better of it and leads him in the opposite direction. They’re silent for a few minutes as they wander, though the curiosity in Aziraphale’s mind runs off of him in waves with his inquisitive expression and bewildered wringing of his hands. Crowley finally stops them in front of a random suit of armor. 

“It was Harry, with the book,” he says, orderly and leveled out. Nothing is amiss.

Aziraphale frowns. “He broke into the library?” His face falls, and he looks a little betrayed. Crowley almost feels guilty having to tell him. “He stole a book?”

“Ah- Tried. It was probably something about Flamel again.” 

“Still.” Aziraphale sighs. “It seems… rather out of character, doesn’t it? I’ve only ever known Harry to be respectful of the books, even if he’s a bit of a troublemaker.”

“I dunno, Zira. A rebellious streak isn’t always bad,” Crowley reasons, teasing a little. “Should we get back to it?”

Aziraphale nods, and they do.

Nothing about Harry seems amiss the next day. He’s normal in classes, and meals, and even in Hagrid's hut— even if he seems a little overeager to leave, and go back to his dorm, or elsewhere. Crowley is loathe to tell Aziraphale about the mirror, so he forces himself into casual nonchalance and avoids the issue like any sensible Demon, Angel, or Almighty would do. 

It doesn’t help. He wakes up the next day in a horrible mood, and his classes, who decide to be annoyingly rowdy, suffer. He avoids Aziraphale and thinks. What he thinks about, specifically, floats about the mirror.

It was a mistake of creation, he supposed. Gluing quarters to sidewalks, inventing narcissistic photography, messing with telephone lines, that was his lot in life. Those things would only put the people who really deserved it in hell. Any person who killed someone and blamed it on a single bad day was probably not a very good person or a liar. 

The Mirror had come about only a few months before he’d taken his century-long nap. It was a child born from worry -- he was afraid hell was getting a little annoyed at his lack of hugely demonic feats. So, instead of claiming something else humanity had done as his own, he created.

He’d created before. Snakes. Stars. All manner of things that humans either took for granted, loathed, covered up -- or very rarely -- admired. The Mirror was not hard to create. The gold was breathed from his shedded snakeskin, the glass blown from whispers and worries. The inscription was carefully etched in with a demonic blade and that toppled with permanence and reverence in it making. On his last day of working -- after seven days, actually -- he’d stood back.

He was draped in layers of sweat and exhausted, but somewhere around the third day, he had gotten much more involved in his task than expected. He pulls a drenched arm up and wipes it across his forehead, slouching over as his back snaps at him angrily. 

The gold shined as brilliantly as a nebula. The mirror spoke with something -- a faint outline of a desire that Crowley couldn’t quite see -- and glinted against his eyes like flint to stone. The clawed feet looked ready to mobilize, to enter, to ask you a salacious question that would send any sociable person of the time into a fit of tittering whispers. It made fun, it laughed, it mocked its creator like humanity mourns it’s God. 

After about three minutes, he decided it was ugly, bulky, and probably half useless. It had stood dutifully in a wizard’s equivalent of a thrift shop ever since. He’d thought it would be loyal enough to know it’s place and stay there. Obviously, it had become antsy. 

So, on his third night knowing that it had found a new home, he confronts it. The child he hated had begun to corrupt the child he’d willingly taken in. He’s had enough of corruption. Humanity didn’t have a form of a fall, really, but Harry had a dark enough path that could await him if he gave in. 

The halls, dark as ever, reverberate with someone else’s footsteps. Crowley finds himself drawn to them -- no one else should be up at this house. They draw nearer and nearer, drifting towards the library and the hidden room that he was so wishing could’ve just been empty.

He’s too late to speak to them. Harry is already inside, and the unknown figure reveals itself as Albus, shrouded in moonlight, unaware of Crowley’s presence. Harry whirls around at the man’s arrival, eyes widening and his face turning a darkened shade of anxiety.

“I-” He swallows. “I didn’t see you, sir.”

“Strange how nearsighted invisibility can make you.” 

The Headmaster smiles, and Crowley presses himself further into the darkness as he shifts. 

"So," Albus continues, and he slips off of the desk he’d just sat on only a moment before. He sweeps across the floor like a ghost, and finally, sits on the floor next to Harry. A wistful stare and a glimpse of silence. Crowley wonders what a man like him might desire. 

“You, like hundreds before you, have discovered the delights of the Mirror of Erised. "

"I didn't know it was called that.”

Albus nods. "But I expect you've realized by now what it does?"

Harry considers it for a moment. "It -- well -- it shows me my family--"

Something irritatingly worried rises in Crowley’s chest, and he nearly sighs aloud. He’s not surprised in the slightest about what Harry sees. It was only natural — but that doesn’t mean he can’t feel for his Godson’s losses. As an immortal being, he had seen many deaths, and Azrael hadn’t spared a single one. 

He’d always loved Azreal. With their wings of fashioned ebony and soul-light, twin only to Raphael, he’d been the closest in nature and light. Still, he was neither spared nor favored by Death. 

Albus continues, interrupting Harry. "And it showed your friend Ron himself as head boy. "

Harry glances at him in disbelief. "How did you know -- ?"

"I don't need a cloak to become invisible," he says gently. "Now, can you think about what the Mirror of Erised might show us all?"

Harry shook his head. 

"Let me explain.” Albus carves the edge of a clawed foot with his wand for a moment. “The happiest man on earth would be able to use the Mirror of Erised like a normal mirror, that is, he would look into it and see himself exactly as he is. Does that help?"

Harry thought. Then, slowly, with a few revelations rattling his head, he says: "It shows us what we want. Whatever we want... "

"Yes and no," the other man replies quietly. "It shows us nothing more or less than the deepest, most desperate desire of our hearts. You, who have never known your family, see them standing around you. Ronald Weasley, who has always been overshadowed by his brothers, sees himself standing alone, the best of all of them. However, this mirror will give us neither knowledge or truth. Men have wasted away before it, entranced by what they have seen, or been driven mad, not knowing if what it shows is real or even possible. It is a mirror of  _ temptations _ .”

The look in Harry’s eyes confirms that he has realized what that means — that one, vivid word — confirms who he knows has constructed the beast that slyly smiles before him. 

_ Temptation. Tempter. Serpent.  _ Crowley. 

Essentially synonymous -- especially to someone so close to the snake to know his titles. 

Albus sighs, taking Harry’s silence for acceptance. 

"The Mirror will be moved to a new home tomorrow, Harry, and I ask you not to go looking for it again. If you ever do run across it, you will now be prepared. It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live, remember that. Now, why don't you put that admirable cloak back on and get off to bed?"

Nodding, Harry stands up and begins to tuck the cloak over his shoulders. It swishes over his ankles, making soft noises against his socks, and making them see-through as the fabric ripples gently. 

"Sir -- Professor Dumbledore? Can I ask you something?"

"Obviously, you've just done so," Dumbledore smiled. "You may ask me one more thing, however. "

Harry hesitates, then continues.

"What do you see when you look in the mirror?"

"I?” 

Albus smiles.

“I see myself holding a pair of thick, woolen socks. "

\---

Albus has left the room, silence chasing his heels, eyes shadowed with cruel moonlight and glass. He trusts Harry to leave on his own, and that is a foolishly given trust. Crowley's presence melts out of darkness, eyes first to shine, then the rest of his corporation drifting into a line of sight that Harry can understand. His presence was never really hidden to his perceptive young godson.

“Why’d you do it?” The boy asks, emotionless. 

“I’m a demon, Harry.” He walks forward, staring at the mirror with an odd look. His mouth twists to a grimace.

“Aziraphale always says you’re not very good at it.” 

The boy walks to Crowley, and stands next to him, looking at his parents. Crowley, the creator, cannot see anything but his own reflection. Maybe -- he used to muse, while a bit too drunk -- he only saw himself, because of some narcissistic, nostalgic view of what he should’ve been. If he hadn’t fallen -- what he would've been.

But, he’s a demon now. It doesn’t matter — there was no Angel of time to barter with — unless you thought that God might move her pawns in your favor. Eventually, The Universe slides it’s own to the left, and She realizes listening to you might not have been such a good idea. 

“Aziraphale is a bastard.” He leans over and picks up the fabric cloak on the ground, watching as his hands fade immediately. 

“That’s nice,” Harry says, deadpan. Crowley has to admit that he’s probably complimenting the Angel at the same time he is cursing him. But, instead of staying in this uncaring mood, Harry softens and looks at him again, all big, curious eyes and hands clutched childishly into the edges of his cloak where Crowley has handed it back to him. “But… why?”

“I don’t know,” he whispers. “I thought I needed to.” He shrugs. “I was wrong. 

“Ah- I think I’m going to take a hammer to it?”

Harry nearly giggles. “I thought professor Dumbledore needed it?”

Crowley ruffes Harry’s already torturously messy hair. “Screw Professors,” he tells the boy in a low, mischievous voice. The mirror, with its disobedient atoms and fickle nature, starts to itch nervously to  _ run." _

“I-” Harry shuts his mouth for a second and reflects on the nature of his next words. Then, without breathing between words, he asks:

“Do you see anything?”

Crowley shakes his head.

“Unless I’m so bloody infatuated with my own face that that’s all I see,” he starts, smiling before he drops his grin. “Then no. Y’ think any Almighty sees themself in their creations?”

“I dunno.” He looks up at Crowley. Crowley looks down at him.

The world decides the conversation has ended, and they make their way to the Gryffindor common room in silence. 


	7. The Forbidden Forest

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m back! But... maybe not for long.
> 
> With all of this quarantine stuff, I’ve been extremely stressed. I’m living in a very unhealthy household, and I may be loosing access to most of my technology soon because of it. On top of that, life has just been,,,, bad, lately. I’m just not quite having a great time. 
> 
> Still, I hope that I can post again soon. I love this fic, and I love all of you. Stay safe guys ❤️❤️❤️

Harry, quite clearly, was hiding something from his guardians. 

There was a level of distrust to him that was so palpable you could rake a hand through it, and it should’ve made any Demon proud. Of course, seeing as Harry was meant to be able to  _ trust _ Aziraphale and Crowley, and was only eleven, it was more disconcerting than anything.

The sort of “final straw” came right after Harry’s most recent quidditch match -- which he had won almost instantaneously. That feat had given him an exceptional amount of Gryffindor points, but hadn’t kept Azirpahale or Crowley from trying to find out what was happening.

And so -- when the straw broke -- it broke with a snap and detention.

At first, the two inhuman beings had assumed the trio were only stressed out over their exams. It made some sense -- with Hermione egging them all on to study and work -- but even Aziraphale had to admit he had begun grasping for straws when Harry and Ron “studied” their way through Snape’s class by sleeping. He’d overheard the gossip in the teacher's lounge. Even if Snape was deserving of a good wake up call -- in the form of the opposite from his students -- it didn’t give the two the right to sit and dawdle. 

This had earned them both two nights of detention, which had left the two grumbling for much more than two nights. 

The second straw was the fact that they didn’t complain to Crowley about their punishment  _ once. _

But the final, most egregious straw by far, was only actually an excuse from Crowley to start intervening more, really. It wasn’t quite as bad as the three could’ve done. 

But still, it right pissed Minerva off, sending her into a furious rant the next day over tea -- raving about how she never thought “the  _ Potter _ or  _ Granger _ ” children would “turn into two-wit bullies, who “snuck out” and “smuggled.” This, she told them, under the assumption that Harry was still under his Uncle’s care. Aziraphale and Crowley had decided that information was better staying what she believed for the moment, anyways.

So, now with this newfound excuse to peek into their Godson's life just a little, they decided to take over their detention. Just this once.

—-

“Is that you, Argus?” Crowley shouts out into misty darkness, one hand shoved into his pocket as he leans forward, the other over his eyes as he squints. 

Aziraphale stands behind him with Hagrid, the two chatting about whatever it was they could be chatting about whilst about to take a jovial trip into the Forbidden Forest. 

“Ah-” Argus says something to the four children walking alongside him, then cackles into the wind like a throbbing howl. He emerges from the fog, lantern wavering in his grip. “I’m- I’m here,” he grumbles, clearly displeased with his coworker’s presence. 

Malfoy, Neville, Harry, and Hermione all shiver a little within the oppressively cold night, nervously eyeballing the forest. Rubeus, with his frightening crossbow, comes stepping into the light, his dog on his heels and Aziraphale walking up beside him. 

"Abou' time," Rubeus says coolly. "I’ve been waitin' fer half an hour already.”

Harry looks up at his godparents, almost nervous. Aziraphale smiles. Crowley does not. 

"I shouldn't be too friendly to them, Hagrid," Filch reminds Rubeus, cold and corpse-like. His voice practically has rigor mortis. “They're here to be punished, after all. "

"That's why yer late, is it?" Rubeus frowns. "Been lecturin' them, eh? 'Snot your place t’ do that. You’ve done yer bit, I'll take over from here."

"I'll be back at dawn, for what's left of them," Filch adds in a filthy tone before turning back to the castle, lantern once again bobbing in and out of the darkness like a ship on a murky sea. 

Malfoy turns to his professors now, glaring.

"I'm not going in that forest," he says, voice beginning to sound a little panicked.

"Yeh is if yeh want to stay at Hogwarts," Rubeus tells him firmly, before softening, just a little.

"You’ve all done something wrong, and now you know you need to pay for it.” Aziraphale smiles. “It isn’t a hard task, students.”

"But this is  _ servant _ stuff,” Malfoy whines petulantly, his voice nasally and fearful. Harry very clearly has to stifle a snort. Crowley, who does not care quite as much, does not stifle anything. “It's not for students to do. I thought we'd be copying lines or something! If my  _ father  _ knew I was doing this, he'd--"

"He’d tell y’ that's how it is at Hogwarts," Rubeus growls. "Copyin' lines! What good's that t’ anyone? You’ll do somethin’ useful or you'll ge’out. If yeh think y’ father'd rather you were expelled, then get back off t’ the castle an' pack.” 

At Malfoy's incredulous look, he waves a hand back to the castle and raises his eyebrows. “Get on then!”

Malfoy, stubbornly a coward, refuses to move. He glares at each of the Professors quickly then drops the look when Crowley glares back.

"Right then," Rubeus says, significantly more cheery again, as if Malfoy’s voice was the source of most of his troubles. "Now, listen carefully, 'cause it's dangerous what we're gonna do tonight, an' I don't want no one takin' risks. Follow me over here a moment.”

He leads them over to the barest edge between Forest and Hogwarts grounds. The wind whistles between the gaps in the group, finding absences and tugging, pulling each of them deeper inside. The tree branches almost seem to whisper to them, but a few of the group have the nice and accurate ability to politely ask them to “back off.”

"Look there," Rubeus says, calloused hands pointing to something glowing bright on the path. "See that stuff shinin' on the ground? Silvery stuff? That's unicorn blood. There's a unicorn in there been hurt badly by sum’. This is the second time in a week. I found one dead last Wednesday. We're gonna try an' find the poor thing. We might have to put it out of is’ misery. "

Crowley, who, almost being one of the last people in the world to witness the death of all unicorns, steps forward now. He’s rather been hoping to have Aziraphale apologize, what for the flood and all. 

“We’re going in groups,” he says, leaning over with his hands tipped behind his back and heels braced against the wind. “Ngk. Malfoy, you can go with Longbottom and Rubeus.” He tips his head to the two boys.

“I don’t want to go with that o-”

“Oh, shut your bloody  _ trap,”  _ Crowley snarls. “I don’t care about what your father is going to hear about -- you’re going out there and you’re going to-” he throws his hands up. “Do… Do whatever the  _ heavens _ Rubeus tells you!”

Malfoy, looking more than a bit frightened, steps back and swallows. He joins his group without another noise.

“Now,” Crowley begins again, grinning. “Potter. Granger.”

“You’re with us,” Aziraphale says helpfully.

“For the rest of the night.”

“I suppose,” Aziraphale finishes. He frowns. “Now, we really must be going on. I do hope that poor unicorn isn’t too badly injured…”

The forest, black and silent, looms within them as they step inside its swampy depths. Crowley flicks his wand into sight and a large plume of white light erupts at its tip, lighting a bare and beaten path, overgrown with plants, some of which shrink under the wand light. He heads the group, splitting off from Hagrid, Malfoy, and Neville as they wander deep into the leftwards depths of the forest.

Harry, who looks like he’s very badly trying to be nonchalant, stays silent, till he hears the whistling call of a wolf's howl. His head whips in its direction, light brown skin illuminated by the incantation set by Crowley.

“Do you think a werewolf could he hurting them?” He asks, frowning in worry. 

“They’re not fast enough,” Aziraphale tells him.

“They’re bloody powerful magical creatures,” Crowley surmises. “When they’re not drowning. Drowning kills a lot of things. Even ducks…”

“Hush.” Aziraphale swats his arm. “Anyways, you two. Would you like to tell us what you’ve been hiding from us?”

Harry splutters. Hermione nearly trips over a bush, her dark skin turning pale in surprise.

“Wh- what do you mean?” Hermione asks, polite and careful. 

“You two,” Crowley continues, peering into the treeline. A stream babbles to accompany his thoughts. “Have been hiding something. I should say you three, but bloody Weasley isn’t here.” He whips around. “All three of you are up to something -- and I can practically smell the “I’m casually going to get myself killed” circling around you. It’s like vultures.” 

“I-” Hermione gulps. “All due respect Professor, but I’m not sure if it's… us, you should be worried about. We’re not really up to anything, but Qu-”

But, she cannot tell them who it is they should be worried about just yet.

In a sudden surge of movement, Crowley shoves the two behind a tree, and Aziraphale steps forward, wand arm thrown out, the other tucked behind his back. His wand erupts in blue light, streaking forward to hit something not far away. It shrieks, before falling to the ground. 

No one can see anything but the faint shape of a dark black cloak before the only sound is that of fabric dragging against leaves and heavy breathing.

There’s a long pause, in which a frightened silence grows even more thunderous.

“That-” Crowley moves the two out from behind the tree again. “That was not meant to be here.”

“No,’ Aziraphale says quietly. He looks back at Crowley, and the demon nods. 

(Something about it -- its signature, its force, its very  _ being  _ \-- was far too similar to the black thing residing in Harry Potter’s head.) 

“Stay behind us,” Crowley hisses, straining to hear anything of the barest sound. Something rustles in the clearing before them. He points his wand up, about to attack it when it falls on an unfamiliar figure, cloakless.

To the waist, the man was just that -- a man. A man with a beard and Irish red hair, with eyes gleaming with sorrow. Below that, he had the gleaming chestnut body of a horse. He held a bow, which was notched with arrows, and pointed right at Aziraphale’s head. The Angel’s hands go up in surrender, and he steps back a little.

“Hello,” he says, swallowing. “This is too much paperwork.”

The Centaur raises an eyebrow, then drops the bow. “My apologies. I passed Rubeus earlier -- you must be the others he spoke of.”

“Er- Yes.” Crowley nods. “I’m Crowley-” he points to the others. “That one there’s Aziraphale, then Hermione, then Harry.”

He nods. “I know who you are. Especially-” he points to Crowley. “You. You smell of stardust.”

“I- I do?” 

The Demon, who looks thoroughly confused, steps backward.

“My name is Rowan,” the half-man says, nodding. He lets his bow fall completely within his lazy grip, fingers barely brushing the ages and weathered wood. It is smoothed with thousands of uses. Suddenly, he throws his head backwards and stares into the sky unblinkingly. “Mars is bright tonight.”

Crowley looks up as well. There’s a moment of silence -- in which a very complicated look dashes across Crowley’s face, then rolls back into obscurity.

“Ah- yes,” he says softly. “I suppose it is.” 

He clears his throat and pushes his glasses back up onto his nose. 

“But- ngk- Ronan, have you seen an injured unicorn anywhere around here?”

Ronen stares at the sky a moment longer, blue eyes shining with moonlight. He almost looks sad.

“Mars is unusually bright.” Finally, he looks back down, as if awakening from a deep sleep. He looks back at Crowley, then Aziraphale, then Harry than Hermione then back into nothingness, or perhaps someone deep inside the leaves. “The Forest hides many secrets.”

Another presence bursts from the edge of the clearing. Another centaur -- hair braided tightly and black dappled body slightly larger and more imposing than Rowan’s -- glares at those who stand before him. 

“Who-”

“Hagrid’s,” Rowan says, turning to meet the other. “Hello, Bane.”

“Ah. Hello, Ronan,” Bane responds tiredly, before nodding at the small group in understanding. “Why are they here?”

“What might anyone else be doing in the forest?” Rowan asks him pensively. The other nods.

“Mars is bright tonight,” Bane says, as simple as Rowan had. His hair, coarse and rough, drags upon his back like starlight as his head is thrown backward.

When no one else can seem to get an answer from them, they wander from the clearing, searching for that which is buried farther between the trees than they'd thought.

“Never try to get a straight answer from a stargazer,” Crowley growls.

“I could say the same of you, dear,” Aziraphale tells him gently, before turning to the children between them, not waiting for his Demon to retort. “I want both of you to stay a little closer now. If either of you become lost, fire a red flash into the air.”

The two nod, and so the group walks on. They walk further and further, and the trail of blood starts to grow larger, till great soupy puddles flow into the dirty pathway.

“So, what is it you two have been hoarding?” Crowley asks, whirling on his heel. “Still looking for an excuse to incriminate one of y’ teachers?”

“I-” Hermione glares.  _ “We  _ haven’t been doing  _ anything,  _ professor.”

“I mean this in the kindest way possible dear,” Aziraphale says. “But none of your group are very good at hiding secrets.”

Before she can snap back, they’re interrupted again. Harry points down below them, in another clearing, where something has begun to glimmer with light.

“Look,” he says, swallowing down his fear. 

It was the unicorn. It shone with a light all of its own, silver mane thrown against its slender face. Its long legs sat at broken, bleeding angles, skin folded and torn from where it had fallen. It looked beautiful, but heart-wrenchingly sad, in an almost incomprehensible way.

Harry had just taken a single step forward- 

-When a black thing came writhing from within the wood, slithering pitifully against the leaves. It shone with the blood of a unicorn against its shredded cloak and broken skin.

It began to drink from its hide.

Hermione gasps in disgust, and Aziraphale draws the two children backward. Caught, the beast glances up towards them, where it begins to undulate forward, beady red eyes starting to peer at its prey curiously.

Harry falls to his knees, a gasp of pain ripping from his chest as the things eyes bore into him. Right as it seems to reach the group-

Someone new burst from the trees. A centaur, not Rowan or Bane, runs forward and charges the figure, driving it away before wings can spring from the back of anyone in defense. Their white hair shakes from their face as they land in front of the group, eyes narrowing in on Harry, who was being helped to his feet by Aziraphale. Crowley stares at the centaur.

“Are you alright?” the newcomer asks Harry, eyes troubled. He had a palomino body, with bright blue eyes akin to nothing but sapphires. 

The moonlight shines against him. The corpse below them shines with dripping blood. 

“Yes,” Harry whispers, a little unsure of himself.

“Thank you,” Hermione and Aziraphale seem to gasp at the same time. 

“What was that?” Crowley asks. 

(It’s clear that everyone in that clearing has an idea of what they had just encountered. The centaur does not answer.)

“You’re the Potter boy,” he says simply. “These woods are not safe for you. Especially right now.” He looks to the sky. “Mars is  _ too  _ bright.”

“Erm-” Harry nods. “What- what was your name?”

A moment of silence.

“Firenze,” he says softly, before dropping down from his invisible perch within the stars, still seeming to stare past the group before him.

“Firenze,” a voice snaps from behind them, and Bane and Rowan dive from the trees, flanks sweaty and heaving. They twitch backward at the sight of the unicorn, but keep forward, glaring at the white-haired centaur before them. “Have we not sworn ourselves to never go against the Heavens?”

“Do you not know who this boy is?” Firenze snaps back, intolerance in his eyes. “This is the Potter boy. It isn’t safe for him to be here. The quicker he leaves the forest the better.”

“Bane, I’m sure Firenze was acting how he saw best,” Rowan says in his sad voice, even softer now, as if mourning the beautiful corpse behind him.

"For the best?!” Bane swiftly turns to his accompaniment, angrier now. “What is that to do with us? Centaurs are concerned with what has been foretold! It is not our business to run around like _ donkeys after stray humans in our forest!" _

Firenze suddenly reared on to his hind legs in anger, eyes flashing, and those behind him forced to take a step back.

"Do you not see that unicorn?" Firenze bellows, eyes wide, hand thrown in front of him, a sweeping path through the air that stabs mournfully into where the unicorns prone form lies, still. "Do you not understand why it was killed? Or,” he continues, tugging his hand to his chest. “Have the planets not let you in on that secret? I set myself against what is lurking in this forest, Bane,  _ yes,  _ with humans alongside me if I must.”

And Firenze whisks around, staring into the humans and non-humans behind him, urging them away from the others, who stare at his back in silence. 

They travel back through weaving trails of unicorn blood and dirt, following him within the quiet without a protest heard.

"Why's Bane so angry?" Harry asks, the first to begin breaking the silence. "What was that thing you saved us from, anyway?"

Firenze slowed his pace a bit but did not answer. The group continued on through the trees for so long without an answer that Harry began to wonder if Firenze was uninterested in speaking.

Then, suddenly, the centaur spoke, stopping in his tracks without turning his head. “Do any of you know what unicorn blood can be used for?”

"No," Harry responded, startled. "We've only used the horn and tail hair in Potions. "

All those who know what Unicorns can do stay quiet, and Firenze nods.

"That is because it is a monstrous thing, to slay a unicorn," Firenze tells him somberly. "Only one who has nothing to lose, and everything to gain, would commit such a crime. The blood of a unicorn will keep you alive, even if you are an inch from death, but at a terrible price. You have slain something pure and defenseless to save yourself, and you will have but a half-life, a cursed life, from the moment the blood touches your lips.”

Harry stared at the back of Firenze’s head from behind him, watching the moonlight dappled strands.

"But who'd be that desperate?" he wonders, out loud, as if talking to himself. He taps his lip curiously, then runs a hand through his hair. It still seems to shake a little. The conversation seems to belong only to the two now. "If you're going to be cursed forever, death's better, isn't it?"

"It is," Firenze agrees. "unless all you need is to stay alive long enough to drink something else -- something that will bring you back to full strength and power -- something that will mean you can never die. Mr. Potter, do you know what is hidden in the school at this very moment?"

“The Philosopher’s Stone,” Crowley whispers roughly, before clearing his throat. “You already know, don’t you?”

Hemione and Harry nodded, confirming the suspicions of the others.

Firenze continues. 

"Can you think of nobody who has waited many years to return to power, who has clung to life, awaiting their chance?"

Harry goes very white in one single second. The trees seem to collapse in his vision, and he shudders.

“You mean that was V-”

But he is given no chance to finish.

“All of you!”

Rubeus comes bounding forward, followed by a mud-covered Malfoy, Neville, and Fang. He looks white as a sheet under his massive beard.

“Are y’ all alright?” He gasps, crossbow raised to point to whatever might be following them. “Everyone’s ok?”

“We’re quite alright, Rubeus,” Aziraphale says simply, the light upon his wand winking out to join the void around it. “Everyone is fine.”

“The unicorn is dead -- back in that clearing. Bane and Rowan are burying it.” Firenze glances back at them all. “This is where I leave you all.”

And to Harry -- he turns to him last.

“Good luck, Harry Potter.” He smiles, bittersweet. “The planets have been read wrongly before. I hope that now is one of those times.”

  
  
  



	8. Through the trapdoor

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm very unsure about this chapter, I hope it's ok. Actually, this'll be one of the last ones... gosh, I can't believe this story is almost over.
> 
> Also! Thank you guys so so much for your kind words in the last chapter! I know I didn't respond to all of them, but I love them all.

It was, honestly, a true wonder of the world that no one in Hogwarts spontaneously combusted during exam season. Seeing as it was a highly volatile school of witches and wizards it was surprising that no one in school regularly exploded, no matter what time of year -- especially with the blistering heat of the summers stabbing them in the heals and rolling down their necks wherever they walked.

But, as time proves again, humans are surprisingly resilient. No one manages to die before or after the exams, and Madame Pomfrey is clearly relieved that she has had barely any patients, especially since Crowley and Aziraphale have come to school.

That didn’t stop Aziraphale from needing to escort a few students from the library to the infirmary after numerous issues. Bad panic attacks, fainting from lack of sleep or food, or any other ailment that plagued -- what was too many, in Aziraphale’s opinion -- students throughout the school.

It was much of the same for Crowley, who was forced to pause an exam when a student had fainted at the sight of the plants, and again when a student had disassociated their way into being bitten by a fanged geranium. Aziraphale, who had no exams to conduct, helped to coach students through their studies while ensuring they didn’t spill food everywhere or bring their books where they shouldn’t be brought. This led to quite a few first years being kicked from the room after a few unfortunate pranks rang off renewed bouts of hysteria in those taking the O.W.Ls.

Harry, as committed to only really studying when Hermione recommended it as always, seemed to be faring as well as he could within the blistering heat. It was obvious Crowley enjoyed the warmth, but he seemed to be a bit sorry for his godson nonetheless. The rest of the school was constantly drenched in the sweaty scent of pennies and teenage anxiety, along with something bitter and rotten that seemed to come from Quirinius. The dungeons, the greenhouses, the forest, no one was spared but the common areas, which were cooler by default. Things seemed to be proceeding as normal within the school, or as normal as they could proceed.

But, things weren’t normal by default.

Harry seemed to be having more and more trouble with his scar. He showed up to classes skittish and rubbed furiously at his forehead in a way that showed that he was waiting until he thought no one was watching. He barely spoke to his guardians, though he wasn’t cold towards them. He simply seemed… worried. Worried, almost as if for  _ their  _ safety, and not his own. Aziraphale, who’d known his parents, had explained that it seemed to run in the family. 

Both the Angel and Demon came to regret what became inaction within the situation later on. They left him alone, only making sure he was safe, unable to approach him, worrying that all it would amount to would be a break in their string of trust. Both of them had some experience with children -- but neither Warlock or Adam were the portraits of trusting, normal individuals. 

So, things went on as normal. In fact, the afternoon after all exams had been completed, they resumed their tradition of normal visits to Rubeus’s house for tea and occasional gossip or fun. They’d heard about Norbert, and about everything else that had happened within recent events, but decided it was best not to comment, as the man looked intolerably sad about the area.

“Are you quite alright, Rubeus?” Aziraphale asks. The man across from them has his eyes unoccupied and faraway, and his hands are loose about his mug. His tea hasn’t been drunk from in the slightest. His hut is a mess -- papers and cauldrons and -- eggshells scattered about. Rubeus doesn’t respond with anything but a silent nod, so Crowley rolls his eyes, frowns, and snaps his fingers together.  All of a sudden the hut is almost impeccably clean. Each thing righted, all dishes shining spotlessly, the floor almost entirely cleared, all in one flicked movement of two fingers, no wood or wand involved within a miracle of magic. In fact, the home itself even seemed a little  _ bigger,  _ somehow. 

(Everyone who respected Rubeus was becoming more than tired with his treatment. They reacted accordingly.)

Rubeus gapes at him, and hot coals of embarrassment start to drop in Crowley’s chest. Don’t bring  _ attention to it,  _ he thinks, shutting down and turning away with a sneer. Don’t even  _ think about it. _

But Rubeus doesn’t seem to notice or care about his appearance of “annoyance,” and his mouth stretches into a wide, happy beam, eyes crinkling together into tiny slits. It’s the most exuberant the two have seen him in a while. Losing his companion must have been hard.

“Thank y’!”

He quiets his voice halfway through the lopsided silence.

“Anthony- tha' was-”

“Nothing," he mumbles quickly with a raised glass of tea as if to toast the half-giant, half-man. “It was nothing, Rubeus, don’t mention it, ever, not at all, erg- please, and no thank you, just ignore it.”

“Oh, shuddup,” Rubeus says jovially, before taking a bite of his scone and chewing thoughtfully.

“That was very nice, dear,” Aziraphale says, before taking a sip from his tea. Crowley groans and slides further into his seat like a petulant teenager, sunglasses tipping back onto his eyes and falling from their perch on his head. 

Though, before he can complain, Harry, Hermione and Ron come bursting into the hut, eyes wide, panting, soaked in sweat and legs shaking with exhaustion under their inappropriately dark robes. They gasp, catching their breath, and everyone’s eyes immediately jerk towards them. 

“Ah- yer finishing yer exams now, right?” Rubeus smiles, their hurried expressions unnoticed. “How ‘ave they gone?”

“Good,” Ron tells him. Harry shoots him a look. “H- Hullo, professors!”

“What’re you three out here for?” Aziraphale asks, frowning just the slightest. “And isn’t it too hot for those robes?”

“They’re uniform,” Hermione explains, sounding a little disgruntled herself. She always had seemed confused when the two of her teachers showed up to their posts without uniform, instead opting for more casual -- or tartan and leather -- attire.

“Y’ want drinks?” Rubeus gestures to the tea aligned in front of them. It’s begun to cool. 

“Yes please,” Ron starts, but Harry steps forward.

“Sorry, not right now, Hagrid, we’re in a bit of a hurry.” He grimaces and rubs furiously at his scar, which was starting to look inflamed even against his brown skin. “I've got to ask you something. You know that night you won Norbert? What did the stranger you were playing cards with look like?"

"Dunno," says Hagrid casually, “He wouldn' take his cloak off. "

The three students glance at each other with stunned expressions, prompting Crowley and Aziraphale to listen just a  _ bit  _ more attentively, still sipping their tea as if nothing in the world is out of order.

"It's not that unusual,” Rubeus tells them with a shrug, “ Yeh gets a lot o' funny folk in the Hog's Head -- that's the pub down in the village -- mighta bin a dragon dealer, mightn' he? Anyway, never saw his face.” He ends with finality and sips his tea. “He kept his hood up. "

"What did you talk to him about, Hagrid? Did you mention Hogwarts at all?" Harry asks, sounding desperate.

"Mighta come up," said Hagrid, frowning with the effort of remembering. "Yeah. . . he asked what I did, an' I told him I was gamekeeper here. . . He asked a bit about the sorta creatures I took after. . . so I told him. . . an' I said what I'd always really wanted was..” His expression sours. “A… dragon. . . an' then. . . I can' remember too well, 'cause he kept buyin' me drinks. . . Let's see. . . yeah, then he said he had the dragon egg an' we could play cards fer it if I wanted. . . but he had to be sure I could handle it, he didn' want it to go to any old home. . . So I told him, after Fluffy, a dragon would be easy. . . "

"And did he -- did he seem interested in Fluffy?" 

"Well -- yeah --” he snorts, smirking. “How many three-headed dogs d'ye meet, even around Hogwarts? So I told him, Fluffy's a piece o' cake if yeh know how to calm him down, jus' play him a bit o' music an' he'll go straight off to sleep--"

“Harry, why in the shining Heavens-” Aziraphale pauses, and sighs. “Why on Earth are you asking all of this?” he asks. “Are you alright?”

The boy nods. It's a very unconvincing movement, as he looks a little sick, mouth half open and eyes wide with worry. His friends don’t look much better, and the two inhuman beings share a worried glance as the children leave, the three ignoring the Angel’s final question, no matter how important it way have been.

\---

They’re walking through the halls together. It’s warm, and the sun is beginning to go down, but they want to meet with Minerva and talk. Not about anything particularly scary -- more about how the schedule for patrolling the castle ended up with Aziraphale and Crowley together for an entire  _ month,  _ and on the _exact same_ routes.

(It’s no surprise to Her and the Universe that the teachers have begun to play an ineffable game of their own. As time has proven, bringing an Angel and Demon like them proves…  _ difficult.) _

Suddenly, they see Harry, rushing towards his common room. When he nearly slams into them he curses, leaping backward on his heels and letting out a string of noncommital apologies, about to leave once again before he realizes who he’d encountered.

“Oh- hello,” he says, distracted, and quiet. He glances past them -- where Snape had just walked away from. His expression hardens. “Sorry.”

“It’’s quite alright,” Aziraphale tells him. “But you do need to watch where you’re running inside school halls,” he scolds. He’s still smiling, of course, but Crowley sees tendrils of worry begin to twist about his aura.

Harry nods. “It- err- I promise it won’t happen again. 

He makes to leave, throwing himself away, tossing out of the area in a mad dash. He’s about to rush off when Aziraphale calls his name.

He stops in his tracks, looking behind him curiously. The hot red scar upon his forehead sends a knotted coil of even more worry into Aziraphale, and Crowley turns away, but he shoves it aside with his other worries, pursing his lips and frowning.

“Are you and your friends alright?”

Harry, who looks quite taken aback, frowns.

“Why- why shouldn’t I be?”

“Harry,” Crowley chastises with a roll of his eyes. “You know who the bloody Earth we are. Don’t pretend we aren’t perceptive.”

“I’m…”

There’s a silent pause, in which Harry runs a hand through his hair and adjusts his glasses. He sighs, shakily, then nods to himself, more to reassure himself than the others, helping whatever thought is running through his mind.

“I’m- We’re fine,” he mutters, before turning on his heel and walking away, not giving a single second more for discussion.

Crowley and Aziraphale share a glance.

Better monitor the castle more tonight.

\---

They didn’t  _ want  _ to do it. If he’d known about it, they’d have invited him along. Neville wasn’t particularly skilled, but he would  _ help them,  _ at the very least.

But, they’d been forced to leave his body in the common room, prone, silent, and frozen. The betrayed, pained look in his eyes -- the last moving part of him, asides from his chest -- had sent something sharp through Harry’s heart. Still, he pressed on. Now was not the time to feel guilty. He was sure that Snape would be attacking soon, and that Crowley and Aziraphale would stop Harry from interfering if they knew what he was doing.

But he had to. They all did -- this was somehow everyone’s battle now -- Ron, Hermione, and Harry all in one.

So, they tug the cloak on, and Hermione casts some confusing spell to muffle the noises they make. They hurry, scurrying through the halls, each statue Filch, each draft a ghost about to alert the entire school to their presence. They meet the stairs and climb, only to find shining lamplight eyes at the top.

Yellow, green, and eerily slit, Mrs. Norris peers through the dark and right through the cut of their cloak. 

“Let's just kick her out of the way,” Ron grumbles. Hermione swats his arm, and he falls silent again. When they look back up,  _ Peeves, _ of all inconveniences greets them. 

"Who's there?" Peeves, with his wick black eyes and punched-in face, advances upon them, smiling wetly with shining teeth."Know you're there, even if I can't see you. Are you ghoulie or ghostie?” His curved grin turns darker, and his face nearly bumps into the. “Or…. wee student beastie?"

He rises higher into the air, squinting at them from above.

"Should call Filch, I should, if something's a-creeping around unseen. " He taps at his chin, as if in thought, then lets out a strepitous laugh.

Harry, thinking quickly, has a sudden idea. He lowers his voice.

“Hermione,” he hisses. “Lift the charm.”

She nods through her confusion, and he speaks.

"Peeves," he says in a hoarse whisper, as if about to delve into Parsletongue. "the Bloody Baron has his own reasons for being invisible. "

Peeves almost falls from the sky in shock but catches himself and bows when he lands, shaking.

"So sorry, your bloodiness, Mr. Baron, Sir," he says, voice sniveling and greasy. "My mistake, my mistake -- I didn't see you -- of course I didn't, you're invisible -- forgive old Peevsie his little joke, sir. "

"I have business here, Peeves. Stay away from this place tonight. "

"I will, sir, I most certainly will," Peeves tells his deceivers, before drifting up into the air and starting to float backward in a manner akin to something from a horror movie, fading into blackness. "Hope your business goes well, Baron, I'll not bother you. "

He disappears, Hermione recasts her charm, and they all light out a heavy and collective breath of air, creaking up the stairs best they can and looking for the corridor they know is hidden away somewhere close. 

A few seconds later it appears before them, a stone door, boring and a little battered.

The door was already ajar.

“Well.” Harry sighs. “Snape’s already gone past Fluffy.”

Seeing the door brought out a piece of their fear again. Harry turns to them under his cloak.

"If you want to go back, I won't blame you," he tells them. "You can take the cloak, I won't need it now."

"Don't be stupid.” Ron grins.

"We're coming," Hermione says, a bit less enthusiastic, but determined nonetheless.

Harry pushes the door open, tentative. It swings forward and reveals the gaping room before them.

The door creaked but was accompanied by a far louder sound. Low growling, peaceful, as if asleep, the breathing of an animal. They inch their way inside to see all three of Fluffy’s heads with their eyes closed and chins in their paws.

Hermione, always first to notice the smallest details, swept her gaze about to the sound of a lullaby ."What's that at its feet?" She asked, a mere whisper above the thunderous noise of sleep.

"Looks like a harp," Ron suggests, hissing and pressing closer to the wall. "Snape must have left it there. "

"It must wake up the moment you stop playing," Harry tells them. "Well, here goes... "

He steps out of the cloak, the others following, and walks towards the trap door.

They could smell the hot, rancid breath of the dog as they crept closer. Ron covered his mouth with his sleeve, and said, muffled: "I think we'll be able to pull the door open. Want to go first, Hermione?"

"No, I don't!"

"All right. " Ron bit his tongue and stepped forward, wrenching the trapdoor open by a large brass ring. It very nearly slammed into the floor and awoke the dog, till he caught it just in time, eyes wide and mouth open.

"What can you see?" Hermione asked, anxious as she watches back at the dog and the ever-steady harp noise.

"Nothing -- just black -- there's no way of climbing down, we'll just have to drop. "

“I’ll go first,” Harry volunteers, walking forward and folding his cloak up.

“Are you sure?” Ron looks him up and down. “It’s bloody  _ dark.” _

Harry lumbered over and peeked through, finding nothing but blackness -- no sign of an exit hole or a bottom.

He swallows and makes up his mind. Without time to let himself hesitate further, he leaps down, hooking his fingers into the edge and bracing himself on his feet.

“If-” he gulps. “If anything happens, to me or either of you, get  _ out.  _ And- And- get professor Zira and Crowley. Ok?”

"Right," Ron says, nodding.

“Nothings going to happen,” Hermione reassures. “I’ve got enough brains for the three of us.” 

He smiles at her, then lets it flit away from his cheeks as his scar twitch with heat. 

"See you in a minute, I hope. . . "

And he let go.

Freezing cold air -- colder than the Hogwarts’ winter -- rushed past him, and he had a sickening feeling of his stomach lifting up towards his throat as if he were about to vomit it up in a puddle of gutsy blood.

_ WHAM _

He falls, with a loud, shuddering noise, into something surprisingly soft. Plants, vine-like and warm.

"It's okay!" he calls upward, at a pinprick of light about the size of a postage stamp. "It's a soft landing, you can jump!"

Ron came next, with a gasping noise, as if he’d just puked. He looks over to Harry with a lost expression.

"What's this stuff?"

"Dunno,” He says, shrugging. He couldn’t see it well enough in the light, anyways. “Some sort of plant thing. I suppose it's here to break the fall. Come on, Hermione!"

Hermione lands a moment later, hair stuck straight up and frizzy till she yanks it back down, gritting her teeth angrily and pulling it into a ponytail she’d had on her wrist.

"We must be miles under the school," she says, in awe of it all.

"Lucky this plant thing's here, really,” Ron says, blase.

_ “Lucky?!” _

Hermione leaps up, struggling to gain traction and get to the grimy wall across from her. She struggles most because as soon as she stands, the vines start to creep about her legs, tugging her back down.

Ron and Harry were faring just as badly. It yanked them around, curling over their legs and arms as if trying to suffocate them or pull their limbs apart.

"Stop moving!" Hermione orders, as she starts to go limp herself. "I know what this is -- it's Devil's Snare!"

"Oh, I'm so glad we know what it's called, that's a great help," Ron snarls. It twists about his neck. He cuts off.

"Shut up, I'm trying to remember how to kill it!" said Hermione.

Harry, who had decided he actually didn’t hate herbology once he realized Crowley would be an obviously engaging teacher, thinks as hard as he can to that second -- or third? -- lesson, where Neville had dropped his, or something like that, and Crowley had that box with lights-

“Light!” He gasps, through a constricted breath. “Hermione, it’s light!”

"Oh, right!" Hermione says, and sends a jet of bright blue flames at the green, sending a muttered apology to her professor, as Harry winces. Ron, who was about to be eaten, could only muffle a scream.

Finally, the plants withdraw, and they’re tossed unceremoniously to the ground below. They and hard, gasping at the sharp release, but it’s better a feeling than the feeling of vines wrapping about their air and stealing it away.

“How did you remember that, Harry?” Hermione asks, a little shocked. “I thought you and Ron hated herbology.”

“I-” he looks at the plants above and grins. “Professor Crowley and Zira are my godfathers. I live with em.”

Hermione and Ron stare.

Their jaws drop.

(It’s a little funny, really.)

“Mate, they’re  _ what?”  _ Ron asks, breaking the silence. Hermione snaps back to normal as well.

“My-”

“No, Harry, we heard you, but why didn’t you tell us?” Hermione looks a little betrayed.

Harry begins to feel a bit guilty. “No one is supposed to know yet, really. The school doesn’t know that I live with them. I’m supposed to be with-”

“We thought you were living with foster parents or something, Harry,” Hermione tells him.

“Well, Ron ought to know, he met them on the train station,” he says, beginning to be a little cross.

“Harry, you know me! I don’t play any bloody attention!”

“He is right,” Hermione agrees.

“Anyways -- can we go stop Snape instead of trying to discuss my guardians?” he asks irritably.

“Of- Of course,” Hermine grumbles.

“I jus’ wish you could’ve gotten us out of detention,” Ron says mournfully, but Harry ignores them, and they advance forward.

"This way," Harry says as he points at a door on the far wall, which seemed to be the only way forward. They step inside to find themselves in what looks to be a sewer tunnel, with murky swamp water below them.

The only thing to be heard besides their own breathing was the steady downward trickle of water within the tunnel. It sloped downwards, and its cavernous size was reminiscent of Gringotts.

"Can you hear something?" Ron whispers all of a sudden, stopping them.

Harry listened. A soft rustling and clinking seemed to be coming from up ahead. "Do you think it's a ghost?"

"I don't know. . . sounds like wings to me."

"There's light ahead -- I can see something moving,” Hermione tells them.

When they reach the light, they realize it’s the next room. It glitters with a brilliant, beautiful bright light, and its enormous depths are filled to the brim with bookshelves. Above the rows upon rows of books are… birds. They shimmer in the ceiling, flashing bright, silver, and gold, cold tones matching the warm, earthen books and the slight stench of rot.

"Do you think they'll attack us if we cross the room?" Ron asks.

"Probably," Harry says, looking around. “I think this is Aziraphale and Flitwick’s challenge…”

“And that last one was Professor Crowley’s.” Hermione nods.

“They don't look very vicious, but I suppose if they all swooped down at once. . . well, there's no other choice. . . I'll run.”

Harry takes in a deep breath, covers his face with his torn robes the best he can, and dashes across the room, anticipating the scratch of a thousand glittering birds lest his pace fall behind. He puts his hand to the door and  _ yaks,  _ but all that happens is his wrist pops and starts to smart. When he turns around, the birds are ignoring him just as much as they had been, and so he motions for his friends to cross.

Together, they heaved and yanked on the door, harder and harder. Hermione even tried her alohamora charm, but it didn’t seem to make any difference nonetheless.

"Now what?" Ron says, sneering at the stubborn doorhandle, which had a brass sheen that seemed to mock them like Snape during class.

"These birds. . . they can't be here just for decoration," says Hermione, equally as frustrated.

They watched the birds in silence for a moment, wincing when their bright sheen glowed- 

Glowed?

"They're not birds!"Harry says suddenly. "They're keys! Winged keys -- look carefully. So that must mean…” 

He’s interrupted by a noisy clatter. He and Hermione turn to Ron, watching as his expression twists to surprise as a large spatula falls from an open book.

“Wha-”

Another falls. Then another. Then a pitcher. Then a mixing bowl, and a cup, and a bundle of spoons that slip about the floor, till it’s beginning to get very noisy and very crowded. Ron slams the book shut, but nothing happens. He throws it over the bookshelf, but all that accompanies it is the violent clattering noises of kitchenware from the cookbook falling about.

“We need to fly!” Hermione exclaims, flushed, as she throws herself to the bookshelf. “Quidditch, magic rugs, anything!”

They start their frenzied search, wading through a sea of measuring-cups and hand mixers and vegetable slicers. A knife cuts into Harry’s leg right as Ron trips and gets a nasty knock to the cheek with a mixing bowl. But they continue on, throwing books around until  _ finally,  _ Ron locates a book titled  _ BROOMSTICK LEXICON _ in dark blue lettering, with a witch flying underneath it, waving at them tauntingly.

“Will this work?” He shouts over the din. 

“Yes!” Hermione screams back, pausing to run over to him and grab Harry, tugging themselves along until they reach Ron, who has ripped the book open.

Suddenly, they each are holding a sorry old broomstick, with messy bristles sticking everywhere. 

But, they  _ work. _

They jump on and kick-off, wobbling unsteadily as they rise to meet the keys.

“Find an old, brass one--” Hermione calls. The cutlery has not stopped. “Like the door!”

They grab and snatch at keys, frenzied and fast as the tide of things rise and topple new books, making a mountainous pile of knick-knacks and sharp things to kill a toddler or an adult. 

But, Harry wasn’t the youngest seeker in a century for no reason. He was fast and could see quickly, grasp at small things others couldn’t. His eyes are drawn through the swirl of rainbow-colored wings and bright, perfect keys, till he spots one with a bent handle, wings whirring slow and sad.

"That one!" he shouts. "That big one -- there -- no, there -- with bright blue wings -- the feathers are all crumpled on one side. "

Ron, who was not a seeker, went crashing and banging off to grab it, ran into a mountain of pianos, and almost fell off of his broom. The door was hidden from view by now.

"We've got to close in on it!" Harry stares at it, intent on keeping it within his sights. "Ron, you come at it from above -- Hermione, stay below and stop it from going down and I'll try and catch it. Right, NOW!"

Ron dove down towards, and Hermione up, but it managed to dodge them both. Harry streaked after it and leaned close to his broom -- till he hears a nasty crunching noise where he slams the key into the stone walls.

Ron and Hermione cheer, but it turns into screams when they suddenly start to plummet to the ground, mountains of discarded objects gone along with their brooms. Before there can be any loud splat and sticky blood, Hermione screams out  _ “Wingardium Leviosa!”  _ and they find themselves floating in midair before they’re dropped finally back down. The sore feeling in Harry’s full-body-ache triples, and Ron groans from somewhere nearby.

But, opposite to his norma luck, Harry finds that he is still gripping the key. It struggles in his grip, and he wrenches himself from the floor, dashing madly to the door and shoving the broken, brass key into the lock.

The room and the people within pause to hold their breath. Harry twists the key.

It clicks.

“Bloody  _ finally!”  _ Ron screeches, running at Harry and patting him on the back. “You two were brilliant, mates!”

“You weren’t bad yourself,  _ Ronald,”  _ Hermione says with a smile. Harry grins.

“You’re both fantastic,” he remarks, before shoving the door open with his shoulder.

The next chamber was just as dark as the tunnel down into the Devil’s snare. No entrance or exit, as if the light from the room they stood in now couldn’t reach a void like that, which sucked all the light from everything.

Until, that is, huge flames erupted around the room. They twisted and writhed ferociously, straining to escape their bonds like something animalistic and alive, till they settled, drifting to the floor and showing them a strange image.

They stood at a precipice, the edge of a magnificent chessboard that covered almost the entire room. They were behind the black chessmen -- giants, taller than Hagrid and made of swirling black marble. Across from them were white men, al in rows, guarding one, solitary door.

"Now what do we do?" Harry whispers, as if afraid to awaken any figures.

"It's obvious, isn't it?" Ron hisses, shrugging. "We've got to play our way across the room. "

Hermione looks at them, nervous. “How?”

"I think," Ron repl1ies, unsteady within his answer,

"We're going to have to be chessmen. "


	9. The Man With Two Faces

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow.
> 
> It has uh, been a while
> 
> And now, after what should technically be seventeen chapters, is the end of this chapter in this story. 
> 
> I hope that you enjoy.

Crowley and Aziraphale find solace within the darkened halls of Hogwarts, together. Paintings whisper as they pass. Peeves throw rocks across balconies somewhere below them. Mrs. Norris demands that they pet her -- and only leaves when Crowley finally gives up on walking away and scratches against her nose. 

“Do you think she can smell it?”

Aziraphale glances to him, chuckling.

“You mean your reluctance? No, I don’t think so, dear.”

The demon wrinkles his nose in annoyance, and waves his hand in front of him, affronted. “Not what I  _ mean,  _ Angel.”

“Do you mean can she smell…” The Angel pauses, considering his words. “Us? In that case, absolutely. Cats are awful intelligent, you ought to know that, Crowley.”

“Cats are at least better than ducks,” The Demon reasons to himself, nodding his head back and forth and sauntering onward. 

_ “Anyways-  _ I do believe that we have a more pressing matter than the differences between ducks and cats, now.”

“Uh- yeah- ngk.” Crowley snorts. “Harry is-” He gestures wildly, animated and expressive even behind his sunglasses, still firmly in place and glinting in the rare bursts of light around them, golden-red. “Warlock never did this.”

“Well, Warlock wasn’t... Anything like Harry, really.”

Crowley nods. “I- uh- I- uh-  _ Uh-  _ But what do we  _ think  _ is going on?”

“Puberty.”

A blank stare and about three minutes of laughter later, Aziraphale staring annoyedly at the Demon doubled over before him, Crowley wipes his eyes and stops snickering, snorting only once more when he spots the perturbed expression on his friend’s face.

“Puberty,  _ really Angel?” _

“Oh, and I suppose you have a much more brilliant idea, don’t you?”

Crowley gapes at him, before brushing off into even more laughter, forcing a few more lively portraits to shush him back into smaller, more concealed wheezes.

“Angel, I  _ adore you,  _ but how the hell is puberty the best you can come up with?”

“Well, I’d adore you more if you weren’t so annoying,” Aziraphale shoots back, satisfied at the slide of the smirk on Crowley’s face. Then, he smiles, and chuckles a little, privately, and to himself. “I could blackmail you to heaven and hell and Ursa major and back, with all I know about you and Warlock.”

“Augh-” Crowley snarls. “You  _ wouldn’t.  _ You’re an  _ Angel.” _

“Ah- but a bit of a bastard too, aren’t I?”

Then, the Angel stiffens.

Crowley is about to say something -- some rude, spiteful joke -- when he notices, turning toward his friend with a soft, concerned expression. Something accursedly kind flashes through his eyes, as he sees Aziraphale turn to him, eyes widened in confusion and attention. It’s dead silent within the castle, without the hum of a single creature to disturb them. Just barely -- Crowley can hear his own useless breath.

Then, he hears it too. Faint, nearly imperceptible, a mere whisper where Aziraphale seems to be reacting to a scream. Something desperate. It’s only a feeling at first, an ominous wave of purple-black-blue-red-terror that teeters on the edge of something more, before pitching off the side of its cliff and shouting for  _ help  _ as it  _ plummets _ .

They look to each other, then say, at the exact same time:

_ “Harry.” _

\---

Dark blue eyes -- both dark in shade and in emotion -- stare into Harry as he steps into a huge, cavernous chamber.

Swelling walls held up by pillars of stone and marble. A cave like no other, a chasm filled with fire and heat that lines its walls. It looks to be carved with a fine hand, each detail swelling and beautiful, filled with such intention and intent that it might’ve been called Heavenly.

Right now, the only thing Harry can focus on is the man that stands in the middle.

“Professor Quirrel?”

A smile -- so inhuman, not twitching at all -- flashes across his cheeks.

"Naturally,” he says calmly, devoid of stutter or hush. "I wondered whether I'd be meeting you here, Potter."

"But I thought -- Snape--"

"Severus?" Quirrell laughs, cold as ice and sharp as a knife, as quickly begun as it is over. "Yes, Severus does seem the type, doesn't he? So useful to have him swooping around like an overgrown bat. Next to him, who would suspect _ p-p-poor,  _ st-stuttering P-Professor  _ Quirrell?" _

It felt like something was crushing Harry, weighing down on him. It tasted and felt like his own stupidity. His own blindness.

"But-” He gasps with his reasoning, swallowing. “Snape tried to kill me!"

"No, no, no.” A splitting grin. “You see, I tried to kill you. Your friend Miss Granger accidentally knocked me over as she rushed to  _ set fire _ to Snape at that Quidditch match. She broke my eye contact with you. Another few seconds and I'd have got you off that broom. I'd have managed it before then if Snape hadn't been muttering a countercurse, trying to save you."

"Snape was trying to save me?" He blinks in disbelief.

"Of course," Quirrel agreed, coolly. "Why do you think he wanted to referee your next match? He was trying to make sure I didn't do it again. Funny, really... he needn't have bothered. I couldn't do anything with Dumbledore watching. All the other teachers thought Snape was trying to stop Gryffindor from winning.” He smiles again and lets out a bitter laugh. Bitter by nature, so utterly devoid of life that it seemed to be a laugh built of spite. “He did make himself unpopular... and what a waste of time, when after all that,”

“ I'm going to kill you tonight."

Then, before Harry can swallow a cry, Quirrel snaps, ropes erupting forward and wrapping tightly about Harry, leaving him panicking, eyes wide and vision tunneling to show only the flames and the man before him, seeming to tower above him.

"You're too nosy to live, Potter. Scurrying around the school on Halloween like that, for all I knew you'd seen me coming to look at what was guarding the Stone."

"You- You let the troll in?"

"Certainly.” Quirrel scoffs. Or, whatever it is within Quirrel,  _ scoffs. _ “I have a special gift with trolls -- you must have seen what I did to the one in the chamber back there? Unfortunately, while everyone else was running around looking for it, Snape, who already suspected me, went straight to the third floor to head me off.” Then, he frowns. 

“Not only did my troll fail to _ beat you to death, _ but that three-headed dog also didn't even manage to _ bite Snape's leg off _ properly.”

Quirrel waves a flippant and nonchalant hand as if nothing in the world is amiss. "Now, wait quietly, Potter. I need to examine this interesting mirror."

Then, Harry’s tunnel vision finds it fitting to inspect the one other subject in the room.

Behind Quirrel, stands the mirror of Erised.

Gold, alit in a wreath of flames, shot up with shining light, haloed and a subject to behold. All he can do is stare, as Quirrel stalks toward it, ignoring Harry where he sits, tied together with rope and so very still. His Godfather’s creation, relocated but no more protected.

"This mirror is the key to finding the Stone,” Quirrel mutters, starting to tap along the edge of the golden frame and whisper-soft spellwork. "Trust Dumbledore to come up with something like this…”

Of course, Harry knew that Dumbledore could have had no part in whatever the mirror was doing, located here. But, he wouldn’t say that. All he could think of now was stalling his way through this, trying to grab his wand back from his pocket.

"I saw you and Snape in the forest -- " 

"Yes," Quirrel interrupts, ignoring him to walk about the mirror and inspect its backing. "He was on to me by that time, trying to find out how far I'd got. He suspected me all along. Tried to frighten me -- as though he could, when I had Lord Voldemort on my side..."

Harry stops all of his movement at those words, and the only thing that goes through his head is a very quiet prayer.

_ Voldemort. _

Quirrell steps forward once again, staring with a glorious hunger and viewing whatever it was he desired within the glassy surface.

"I see the Stone... I'm presenting it to my master... but where is it?"

Harry knows struggling is futile -- but  _ stars --  _ he tries, writhing with panic, dark skin slick with sweat. He can only hope now, that someone above or between has heard the whispered plea of help that has shot between his thoughts. He felt like a fool, and tears start to come to his eyes when he realizes he could’ve stopped this all. Crowley and Aziraphale could’ve  _ helped  _ if Harry had thought to trust just a little bit harder _. _

"But-” He takes in a deep breath. No point wallowing now. Might as well continue to distract his captor. “Snape always seemed to hate me so much?"

"Oh, he does,” Quirrel says, snorting.  _ “Heavens _ , yes. He was at Hogwarts with your father, didn't you know? They loathed each other. But he never wanted  _ you  _ dead."

"But I heard you a few days ago, sobbing -- I thought Snape was threatening you...

Finally -  _ finally -  _ something akin to fear flits across Quirrel’s face, and he pauses, if only for a moment.

"Sometimes," he says softly. "I find it hard to follow my master's instructions -- he is a great wizard and I am weak--"

"You mean he was there in the classroom with you?" Harry gapes. Was Voldemort truly, really  _ returned? _

"He is with me wherever I go," Quirrel tells him, quietly, with only a hint of fear, and something deepening in his expression. "I met him when I traveled around the world. A foolish young man I was then, full of ridiculous ideas about good and evil. Lord Voldemort showed me how  _ wrong  _ I was. There  _ is  _ no  _ good  _ and  _ evil _ . There is only power, and those too weak to seek it…”

He sighs. “Since then, I have served him faithfully, although I have let him down many times. He has had to be very hard on me." 

Then, Quirrel shivers. "He does not forgive mistakes easily. When I failed to steal the stone from Gringotts, he was most displeased. He punished me... decided he would have to keep a closer watch on me..."

Quirrell's voice trails off, and he grips his arms as if reassuring himself. Harry only continues to curse his own stupidity -- Quirrel had been there  _ all day.  _

Quirrell curses under his breath and whips around, attention returned to the mirror.

"I don't understand... is the Stone inside the mirror? Should I break it?"

Harry's mind was racing with thoughts. The only thing he wanted more than to stop existing and sink into the stone below him was to find the stone before Quirrell could. He stares at the mirror, thoughts running through his head as he wanders through every conceivable situation Crowley might’ve thought of.

"What does this mirror do? How does it work? Help me, Master!"

A slithering, broken tongue. Rough like sandpaper, broken glass, a green stripe of light, and a terrible pain arching through Harry’s forehead. He stares, pained and terrified, as a new voice seems to come from Quirrel himself.

_ "Use the boy... Use the boy..." _

Quirrell turned on his heel, staring at Harry.

"Yes -- Potter -- come here."

He claps his hands, before turning around. Harry has no choice but to follow, sweltering heat licking his arms as he works his way up downstairs, coming to a stop just beside the man before him.

"Look in the mirror and tell me what you see."

Quirrel moved to stand behind him, a strange, unfamiliar scent flowing from his turban. Harry stares, desperate for a solution, as he looks into the glass of the mirror.

For the first moment, all he sees is himself.

Scratched, tired, with a lightning bolt scar on his forehead. He looks exhausted, as if he’d been carrying the entire room on his shoulders.

But then-

Something appears.

He watches the glass, as his arm raises, slow, gaze unblinking. Something jet red, ruby-like, deliriously beautiful, appears in his palm. 

Then, it flashes away from existence, and his reflection smiles, before disappearing.

"Well?” He demands, impatient. “What do you see?"

Harry, building his courage, turns around and very slowly speaks.

"I see myself shaking hands with Dumbledore," he blurts, with al the forceful truthfulness he can muster. "I -- I've won the house cup for Gryffindor."

Quirrel curses, and for one, horrible moment, Harry thinks he’s been discovered.

Then, he curses again and pushes Harry out of the way. 

"Get out of the way," he instructs harshly. 

Harry tries to run -- to walks, to dance away from the spot -- when that unearthly voice starts to spur him into stiff stillness again.

_ "He lies... He lies..." _

"Potter!” Quirrel turns around and snarls as sharp as a knife. “Come back here! Tell me the truth! What did you just see?"

That high, cruel voice continues, and Harry forces himself to take each step slowly backward.

_ "Let me speak to him... face-to-face..." _

"Master,” Quirrell blurts, half begging. “You are not strong enough!"

_ "I have strength enough... for this..." _

Harry felt as if the world itself had grown over his shoes, his skin taking root within the ground as he stands, petrified, watching Quirrel’s hands move. They’re shaking again, Harry notices with a jolt, as they wrap about the edges of his turban and it begins to unravel. After a moment, and all at once- It drops to the ground.

He wishes he could scream.

Eyes, slit with malice, noseless, lips a knife mark in cold, dead skin cracked with bloody veins and broken flesh. 

_ "Harry Potter,” _ the thing whispers, even more terrible now that its skin is on display, folded and draped in a way that screams inherent  _ wrongness.  _

Harry tries to step away, to run and trip and dive away, but it is as if the world has decided that he is suited for this punishment, as he stands there, unable to move but an inch.

_ "See what I have become?"  _ the face hisses, jerking. _ "Mere shadow and vapor... I have form only when I can share another's body... but there have always been those willing to let me into their hearts and minds…” _

_ A disgusting, shriveled thing -- a grin -- settles on its face.  _

_ “Unicorn blood has strengthened me, these past weeks. You saw faithful Quirrell drinking it for me in the forest... and once I have the Elixir of Life, I will be able to create a body of my own.” _

It all starts to come together, and HArry is powerless.

_ “Now... why don't you give me that Stone in your pocket?" _

Harry, confused and horrified, suddenly regains feeling in his legs again. He stumbles backward.

_ "Don't be a fool," _ it snarls, dark and vicious. _ "Better save your own life and join me, or you'll meet the same end as your parents... They died begging me for mercy.” _

Then, Harry gains his courage and screams.

_ “LIAR!” _

Quirrell had begun to walk backward, the horrible thing -- an  _ it,  _ a pulsating, molded fabrication of Voldemort’s only remaining power -- staring at him as Harry trembles with rage and adrenaline.

"How…  _ touching.” _

It hisses a laugh.

_ "I always value bravery... Yes, boy, your parents were brave... I killed your father first; and he put up a courageous fight... but your mother needn't have died. She was trying to protect you... Now give me the Stone, unless you want her to have died in vain." _

Something bubbles to fruition in Harry’s mind.

"NEVER!"

Harry leaps forward for the stairs, running madly, scrambling over stone. He’s sweating and shaking, but he’s never felt more  _ present,  _ as he prepares to continue to run-

_ "Seize him! SEIZE HIM!"  _ Voldemort screams in rage, spit flying from his mouth as Quirrel turns, lunging for Harry. He shouts in rage, then in  _ pain,  _ his hands wrapping around Harry’s neck only to be ripped away an instant later. White-hot pain, screaming at him, runs through his scar, but he is blind to it, as he continues, desperate. “ _ SEIZE HIM!” _

"Master-” Quirrel lets out a sob of his own pain, pitiful and moaning. “I cannot hold him -- my hands -- my hands!"

_ "Then kill him, fool, and be done!"  _ Voldemort screams.

Quirrel raises his wand, above to let out a green, violent light-

Harry, on instinct, grabs his face between his hands-

A horrible, broken scream of pain and agony-

And Quirrell rolls away, down a stair, gripping his face as his skin flecks away, falling to the ground, puss and blood dripping down the sides of his ruined skin.

Still, he returns, roaring with both pain and determination as Harry grips his arms. The boy screams out on his own, in a mix of the agony within his forehead, building and building, and a readiness to  _ destroy- _

There’s a snap, and his hands fall empty, pain in his forehead gone. He falls against the stairs, knocking his glasses a few feet away as he collapses, grabbing his arms and panting breathlessly. Voldemort was above him, about to strike, screaming in fury-

_ “-Ry! Harry!” _

Someone puts their hands to his shoulders and he jolts.

\---

The stone was heavy.

_ Heavy, hard, sinking,  _ stuck in Crowley’s hand as he stops, skidding to the end of the hall as Aziraphale calls down the key from the room they’ve stepped into. 

(Something awful, and  _ disgusting _ rolls through him, as he thinks of children with lungs more water than air, and brittle bones thrown about, and-)

“Aziraphale,” he hisses, hoarse, and sick. The Angel turns, and blanches, giving up with the key and instead snapping his fingers together, the door opening itself out of its own fear. “We-”

“Come on,” Aziraphale says, yanking his arm and breaking him from his trance. A hard determined look passes on the Angel’s face -- familiar when he was faced with something he  _ truly  _ cared for -- above books, above reason. They run through the door, Crowley tucking the stone into his pocket and the rest of the doors launching open. A shock of red hair appears, a fluff of curly black hair beside them, and Crowley and Aziraphale only share them a passing glance before they snap, sending the two other children up and into the nurse’s domain. They race further within.

Then-

There are  _ screams. _

Fire blooms, against stone schisms in the walls. Glass, empty and cold, stands to reflect the room. Two forms -- screaming -- diving -- one large and one small --

Someone snaps --

And it falls silent, save for the noise of a child falling

Down,

Down,

_ Down. _

Aziraphale and Crowley race for Harry as he plummets, someone shouting his name as they both pull him forward. For one, horrible moment, no response, no breath can be heard-

A gasp, and they both sag in gratefulness.

_ “Fuck,”  _ Crowley gasps, staring at Harry as Aziraphale pulls him into a sitting position. The boy stares listlessly into the air for a moment, where silence continues, before he reaches a shaking hand up, and tries to push up his glasses.

Crowley hands them to him wordlessly, fixing their hopelessly warped shape. The boy stutters out a gasping noise, pressing them to his eyes and turning around.

It looks as if he’s going to say something.

Instead, he passes out.

Crowley catches him quickly, eyes wide as if he wasn’t quite sure that he really had. Then, he shares a look with Aziraphale and nods.

“You have the stone?”

Crowley scoffs, brittle, but somehow soft, as he looks down the child in his arms. “Him and the stone both, now. Dumbledore is lucky I took it off ‘im.”

Aziraphale nods in agreeance, letting out a sigh that he hadn’t known he was holding. 

Then, the room melts away. 

It’s quickly replaced with Madam Pomfrey’s ward, with its empty beds and closed curtains. It’s almost empty -- save for a few scattered forms -- and Hermione blinking blearily at Ron, head nodding as she tries not to fall asleep. Both of them look relatively unscathed, save for a few bruises and scrapes. Harry, on the other hand…

Crowley sets his Godson down on the bed and sighs, running a hand over his face and scowling. He’s cut to hell and back, hands raw, eyes shallowed with exhaustion. It looks like he’d been in a room with Voldemort --  _ fuck, how had they missed this --  _ for years, not just more than thirty minutes. 

_ “Layers of hell,”  _ Crowley breathes, before turning away from the form on the bed and glancing at Aziraphale, soft-eyed as soon as he sees the tightened and worried expression on the Angel’s face. “I’m getting Poppy.”

Aziraphale nods and clasps his hands. “I’ll watch them all.” Then, quieter: “Is he gone?”

Crowley nods. The miracle hadn’t been what had done Quirinius in -- that had been Harry -- with his bloody hands dripping with someone else’s skin, but the flakes of his broken corpse had been miracled out of the room.

Aziraphale nods back and turns back to the children around him. 

\---

Harry reaches for the snitch. It’s a foot from his face -- then an inch -- then his fingers brush against it--

“Hello,” muses Crowley, his sunglasses glinting from above Harry. 

Harry blinks.

“Welcome back,” the demon chuckles, taking his glasses and folding them, putting them in the pocket of his jacket, golden eyes twinkling.

“I-”

“Quir-ass and Voldy are gone. The stone is destroyed.”

Harry gapes even harder. He watches as Aziraphale walks up, taking a gummy frog from a box at the edge of Harry’s bed and biting into it, eyes shining happily.

“Hello, dear!” He says, sliding into a chair on the other side of him Crowley’s seat. “Are you feeling better?”

He thinks over the question, happy to have something new to focus on.

“...Yes,” he says. He’s still unsure if that’s the truth.

Harry finally looks around.

He’s lying atop and under nice white sheets, the room unfamiliar but familiar at the same time -- the hospital wing. At the edge of his bed, there seems to be a whole candy shop amassed. Aziraphale eats another gummy frog, winking.

“It’s from Hermione and Ron and us, mostly,” Crowley says, sounding uncomfortable. “But you’ve got admirers who dropped some off, too.”

He looks at the pile. He looks back at his Godfather. He looks onward, in disbelief.

“You and that fucker-”

“Crowley-”

“That asshole’s adventure in the dungeon is supposed to be a tippy-top-hush-hush secret.”

“So,” Aziraphale continues, laughing, “Naturally, every single student in the universe has heard of it.”

“Fred n’ George tried to send you a toilet seat,” Crowley drawls. “Poppy tried to confiscate it, so I saved it. Grk.”

“How… long have I been here?”

“Three days,” Aziraphale tells him. It seems he’s seen his worried expression, so he waves a hand about gently, and smiles. “But you’re all tickety boo, now!”

“Ron and Hermione were worried as anything,” Crowley adds. “And us.”

“And us,” Aziraphale agrees. 

“The stone is… destroyed?”

Crowley nods. “We got there just in time to get Quirinius off of you. We were…” He pauses, licking his lips. “Almost too late.”

Harry nods, murmuring. “I couldn’t keep him back much longer…”

“No, dear.” Aziraphale looks at him, a soft, saddened thing going through his expression. Harry nearly shrinks away from it, before Aziraphale smiles again if a little sadly. “It almost killed you, Harry.”

For a moment, all he can do is blink, feeling detached. Then, it hits him.

He’d almost died there. He’d thought of death before -- especially once he’d learned how close he’d come to it when he was a baby. Especially with a Demon and an Angel as his Godparents. But, as most things such as death ran, it didn’t hit him.

He almost  _ died. _

“Are Nicholas Flammel and his wife going to be ok?”

They both seemed to have been prepared for very different questions. What’s the afterlife like, perhaps. Would Harry have gone to Heaven or Hell, maybe?

“Erm-” Crowley shrugs, slowly. “They’ll die.”

“Oh.” He frowns, unable to bring his words to his mind, feeling distant.

“But-” He snaps back to attention as Crowley speaks again. “They’ll be ok.”

Harry nods, then shuffles himself upward by his arms, finding his glasses on the bedside table next to him and slipping them on, looking at his guardians with renewed sight. They look as normal as they can be -- which was not very normal, at any time, with what they wore and how they looked and everything about them -- and so he smiles.

"What happened to the mirror, then?" He asks, looking over to Crowley. The Demon looks miffed at the question, and Aziraphale laughs, putting him in line for a biting scowl from the serpent next to him. 

"Crowley... fell on top of it."

The Demon hisses out a garbled growl of rage and glares, yellow eye slit with annoyance when both Aziraphale and Harry start to laugh.

"I was disposing of it anyways! Just- lost m' balance. Shut up, Az’Phale!"

"No shouting!"

Madam Pomfrey walks up to them with pursed lips, glaring and stopping their laughter short, even as Aziraphale and Harry continue to smile, and Crowley hides a smirk beneath his arm as he drags a hand up to replace his glasses. She rolls her eyes and taps her foot, pointing at the two inhuman beings in the room, then swinging an arm around to point at the door, looking as if she's going to grow fangs and start shouting. "Out! Both of you!"

"Oh, but  _ Poppy-"  _

"Zira, I swear to G-"

"Oh, whoops, better not let her do it," Crowley says with a smarmy grin, poking Aziraphale with his elbow before standing and shoving his chair out of the way, stretching, snakeline, and popping his back. "Anyways! Better let Mr. Potter rest." Then, he eyes the food on the table at the edge of his Godson's bed. "Or eat so much he vomits."

"Stop giving him ideas!" Madame Pomfrey shrieks before she puts a firm had to Crowley's back and  _ shoves  _ him. He yelps, grabbing his jacket like there's a hole burnt through it before he gives one last final goodbye to Harry and walks out.

"Rest well," Aziraphale says, before he too steps from the room, smiling.

\---

When they finally leave the room, a few masks drop.

Aziraphale breathes out a heavy, worried sigh, letting his smile drop. Crowley grimaces and walks alongside him, the two silent. They stay on their path throughout the halls of Hogwarts, nearly silent, their footsteps seemingly the only thing awake.

“We almost lost him.”

Crowley looks to the Angel. He’s taken his glasses off, his eyes shining with a strange, wide-eyed look. He nods, then his eyes creep away, slow, as he turns his head back to the floor.

“Wouldn’t be the first person.”

At that, Aziraphale shakes his head, agreeing. “No, it wouldn’t be.” Then, he sighs again. “But-”

Silence, for a moment, where the infallible Angel finds himself losing his taste for speech.

“Not making it any easier, is it?”

Aziraphale chuckles lowly and tucks his hands together, staring in front of him distantly and thinking. 

“No, it really doesn’t.” He turns to Crowley. “You know that. We were both at the ark. And- that isn’t the only instance, is it?”

“Ngk- I suppose not.” The demon straightens again, fiddling with his glasses and slipping them back over his eyes. “Are we really cut out for thisss, Aziraphale?”

“Well, we had Warlock.”

“No.” Crowley shakes his head. “Not by ourselves. And he wasn’t a bloody  _ wizard.” _

“Then what do you suggest we do, dear?” Aziraphale frowns. “Send him back to-”

_ “Stop that,”  _ Crowley hisses, sneering. “You  _ know  _ thatsss not what I meant, Assszziraphale.”

“I  _ know that,  _ Crowley. But I can’t think of any other solutions, and Harry doesn’t seem to dislike us, even if he misplaces his trust, occasionally.” 

Now, Crowley’s the one grappling for words, his hands coming up to gesture his own confusion, hoping to articulate what he feels with nothing occurring. Aziraphale still nods, as if his every mannerism is understood, each tiny movement easy to pick apart and discuss for the Angel. Then, he moans.

“Goodness, Albus still hasn’t figured it out, has he?”

“Shit,” Crowley mumbles. “Damn it all to Hell and damn it all to Heaven.”

“Oh.” Aziraphale squints at him. “Those were capitalized, weren’t they?” Then, he sighs. “I suppose I agree.”

“They were capitalized, because, after the Apocolypse, you would’ve thought that things would’ve been back to  _ normal.” _

“You expected human normal, Crowley,” Aziraphale reminds him softly, looking away. “And- I think- I might’ve as well.” He lets out a sad, sorry chuckle, something strange and warped coming from an Angel’s mouth. “What fools we have been, hm?”

“Bah- we aren’t worse than the above and below.”

Aziraphale nods through another chuckle, this time more genuine. The Universe tilts slightly back into alignment. “Yes, well, no one on either respective committees ever had much sense, did they?”

“Not if they were willing to drop their only good Angel,” Crowley laughs out. 

“Quiet the same as Hell. You seemed to be the only demon with any common sense.”

“Ah.” Crowley shrugs. “That’s where the you and I differ. You were a bloody good Angel, I was a bloody rubbish Demon.”

“I think you were a fine Demon,” Aziraphale argues. “You were good at it in a way that others weren’t”

Crowley considers this, then starts to laugh again, barking it out sharply. “This is a conversation that should happen when we’re  _ drunk.” _

Then, Aziraphale turns back to him, a warm, fondly welcoming smile pressed upon his features.

“You know, I do love you very much, dear?”

Crowly looks over, something wide and surprised in his eyes. Then, he snorts, shaking himself off and looking away. “I suppose ‘s the same with me t’ you, then. Ngk.”

“No,” Aziraphale says, the word drawn out, syllables extended. He quirks an eyebrow upward, then diverts his gaze, looking almost anxious. “I think you… know, what I mean by that.”

Crowley frowns. “What, then?”

“Like-” The Angel looks a little frustrated now, with himself, in an almost self-deprecating way. Crowley steps forward, his arm stretching out -- to touch, to comfort, to hold -- and a soft, almost sad look on his face. 

“Dear, isn’t it obvious?”

Crowley’s breath hitches, as he finally settles his hand on Aziraphale’s arm.

(At that moment, something shifts between the two, and The Universe tugs her hands knowingly to her breast.)

It isn’t sharp, or hot, or excited, the kiss they share. Neither is sure who initiates it, as their lips touch, and they lean toward each other, something pure and good stretching through the air as Aziraphale places his hand to the small of Crowley’s back like it’s keeping him alive, and Crowley clutches the Angel’s shoulders like they anchor him to the ground, tethering him to the star before him. 

It goes on, for a moment, eyes shut and breath extinguished, not in any rush to hurry 6000 years of what has been fated to arrive. But, all good things must come to an end.

(Or, in this case, take a quick interlude.)

Aziraphale pulls away first, his eyes sparkling with something that could be seen as unshed tears, a silent smile on his lips, hands still hugging Crowley close. Then, the Demon follows, wide-eyed and soft, mouth slightly open with a grin that seems as contagious in the starlight in his golden, honey eyes, staring into Aziraphale’s oceanic ones.

“I-”

His voice trembles. The noise falls from Crowley’s throat without his permission, as he stares at his Angel, something like a choked, broken sob. Aziraphale seems to agree with it -- whatever sentiment had been expressed -- as he leans forward, tucking his forehead against Crowley’s and breathing, deep, in the aura of his Demon.

\---

When Crowley and Aziraphale step into the Great Hall, it feels like a moment stolen all for themselves. 

The Angel wears a cream-colored button-down shirt, with a dark, almost black vest, with golden buttons and lines of carved, shimmering gold waving through it. Instead of a waistcoat, he wears a cloak, white and soft like an owls feather, lined at the edges with black and gold and flowing behind him, fluttering birdlike in his footsteps.

Crowley wears something more modern -- a flowing, red shirt tied with a white tie at his neck, his vest black, but with the same golden patterning. He wears red heels that almost match his shirt, making him an inch taller -- if he had stopped his habit of slouching, at least. His cloak is a jet black, lined with white and gold, mirroring Aziraphale as an exact opposite. 

They take their seats at the grand table, between Hagrid and Minerva now, smiling at each other and arm in arm. 

Then, Aziraphale pats Crowley’s arm and shifts away, sitting and looking about the table. As soon as he moves, though, he hears a sorry sigh from Minerva, as she passes a handful of coins to Hagrid.

“What is that for, Minerva?” Crowley grumbles. “A bit of vice and virtue in front of the students, eh?”

“Oh, heavens no, Anthony,” she says primly before her expression falls. “I’ve just lost a bit of a bet, that’s all.”

“We had a betting pool with all th’ teachers, y’see?” Hagrid twists his eyebrows and grins. “Whether y’two were already together, or you’d get togeth’ by the end of the year.”

“Naturally, I thought you had been with each other since the beginning,” Minerva says. She looks embarrassed, as Crowley and Aziraphale stare at each other.

Then, Crowley bursts out into laughter, bowing over the table, and snorting into his hand as he slams the other into the table. Aziraphale chokes on his wine and starts to laugh as well, avoiding the gaze of the other, concerned teachers as he laughs.

Then, Dumbledore steps forward, drifting toward his podium and sweeping a hand over the crowd, silencing it. In the distance, Crowley and Aziraphale see Harry, looking disappointed at the Slytherin colors draped around but still smiling up at his Godparents. They grin back, soft, but excitedly toothy as well. 

“Another year has gone!” Dumbledore grins down to the sea of students below him, nodding sagely with a twinkling glint in his glasses. "And I must trouble you with an old man's wheezing waffle before we sink our teeth into our delicious feast.” A chorus of rumbling laughter rings out, as Crowley ponders what the earth was a wheezing waffle. “What a year it has been! Hopefully, your heads are all a little fuller than they were. You have the whole summer ahead to get them nice and empty before next year starts.”

"Now, as I understand it, the house cup here needs awarding, and the points stand thus: In fourth place, Gryffindor, with three hundred and twelve points.”

Crowley grimaces, a scowl affixed on his face. He should’ve cheated.

(He wouldn’t have, anyways. But, best to keep up appearances.)

“In third, Hufflepuff, with three hundred and fifty-two; Ravenclaw has four hundred and twenty-six.”

Aziraphale smiles at this, proud despite his house's loss, eyes cast happily across the group of students below him, blue and silver looking up to greet him.

Finally, Dumbledore rumbles out the final winner. 

“And, Slytherin, four hundred and seventy-two."

A veritable storm of Slytherins cheer, stomping their feet and tossing things into the air joyously. Snape smiles with satisfaction, crooked, bulbous nose covered in a sheen of sweat that glistens in the light of the hall. 

“Yes, yes, well done Slytherin.” Dumbledore raises a hand, and the noise quells. “However -- recent events must be taken into account.”

The room turns incredibly still, tension suddenly so thick one could draw a hand through it. The Slytherins smiles fade, a little, as they glance between themselves with confusion.

“A- _ hem.”  _ Dumbledore smiles pointedly. “There are a few last-minute points that I believe need to be given out.”

“First…” He hums. “To Ronald Weasley --”

The boy turns a bright, freckled red in the face, lanky limbs shifting uncomfortably under the table he sits at. Fred smacks him on the back, the noise thudding through the room and interrupting the silence.

"--- For the best-played game of chess Hogwarts has seen in many years, I award Gryffindor house fifty points."

The answering screams of the Gryffindor population are nearly enough to blow the ceiling of the castle off and reach the next galaxy over, as people shout their excitement and Percy can be heard shouting, over the din: "My brother, you know! My youngest brother! Got past McGonagall's giant chess set!" 

Crowley rips his glasses off, narrowing his eyes at Dumbledore with a hissing laugh, clapping along with the rest of his house. Minerva seems to be bursting with excitement -- almost as if  _ none of them  _ had been consulted with this last moment change.

Dumbledore raises a hand, and silence returns. 

"Second -- to Miss Hermione Granger--”

She lets out a strangled noise, a hand coming to cover her mouth. 

“--For the use of cool logic in the face attack, I award Gryffindor house fifty points."

The girl’s skin flushes a ruddy shade of red, and she slams her head into her arms, looking as if she must’ve burst into tears. The roars of the Gryffindor table resume again as if they had never ended. 100 points already, and -

"Third--”

The room goes dead silent once again, whispering bursting out after a moment of silence.

“To Mr. Harry Potter... "

“For pure nerve and outstanding courage, I award Gryffindor house sixty points."

The noise was enough to make a deaf man cry, as screams and shouts shake the hall. Crowley pounds a fist into the table and shouts abruptly, looking red in the face, Aziraphale laughing in delight and proud shock next to the Demon.

Those who were able to add while their brains were leaking out of their ears, had realized that Gryffindor now tied with Slytherin for the house cup.  _ Exactly. _

Dumbledore raises his hand and calls for silence -- though it takes quite a bit longer to arrive now.

"There are all kinds of courage," Dumbledore says sagely. "It takes a great deal of bravery to stand up to our enemies.”

A shivering, soft pause.

“But, it takes just as much to stand up to our friends. I, therefore, award ten points to Mr. Neville Longbottom."

It was as if a bomb had gone off.

Heaven and Hell themselves must’ve heard the noise that night, as people leaped around, piling on top of Hermione, Harry, Ron, and Neville, congratulating them and raising the raucous shouting to a crescendo. Hats are thrown, throats are torn raw, and ears are shot to pieces as the Gryffindor table -- alone with a  _ very  _ animated Minerva and Crowley -- receive their wins.

Dumbledore is forced to shout now, above the noise of every single house celebrating the final downfall of Slytherin. 

“Which means!”

He holds up a hand and claps.

“We need a change of decoration.”

Green becomes red, black becomes gold, snakes twisting into a lions brave, pointed snarl, staring down at its supporters with a proud, steely glint in its eyes.

\---

“You two both have to visit,” Ron hisses, narrowing his eyes as he tries to escape his mother once again. “I’ll send you an owl! Both of you!”

“If Harry would like to stay with you over the summer, then he may,” Aziraphale says kindly, Hedwig perched on his shoulder, hooting happily at the idea of a trip to the country. Harry looks up to him, eyes sparkling. 

“Ronald!” Molly strides over, huffing and puffing in annoyance. “You can invite them over later!” Then, she glances up at Aziraphale and Crowley, beaming. “And you two had better not count yourselves out of being invited! It’s bloody cramped at the Burrow, but if Harry is to come, then you’re welcome as well!”

“I- uh-” Crowley stammers, golden eyes widening. “Of- course then, send an owl and we’ll bring him.”

Harry looks up to his Godfathers, eyes sparkling. “I can really go?”

“If the stink eyes that Ron and Hermione were sending us weren’t enough to convince us, we’d already been convinced, dear.” Aziraphale laughs as Hermione looks away, and Ron blinks, as if not realizing he’d been staring. “We aren’t barbarians, and we happen to like your friends quite a bit.”

Harry’s answering grins could sweep Hell clean of demons, Crowley thinks, as he beams up at them. 

They tidy themselves, assuring each other that their items are in order, walking through the great crowds of the wizard’s end of Kings Cross station. An ancient-looking wizard keeps them waiting in line to leave, sending people out in groups of twos and threes as to not surprise muggles into hoping to slam their own heads into the barrier to see what’s behind it.

When they finally leave -- right after Hermione and Ron have both walked away with their families, promising to write -- Harry turns to Aziraphale and Crowley and grins broadly.

“I can really see them?”

“Harry.” Crowley snorts. “I am a Demon. I am mischievous. And evil. Of  _ course,  _ we’re going to let you make problems with your friends.”

“What Crowley means-” Aziraphale shoots him a rather pointed look. The Demon had been loud, and a woman was staring at him with narrowed and untrusting eyes. “Is that while we are here to take care of you, that doesn’t mean you’re  _ stuck,  _ dear.”

Harry lets go of his cart, for a moment and throws his arms around the two. He barely comes up to Crowley’s chest, and Aziraphale -- while not towering -- is still a challenge, but the boy manages. At first, the Demon stares, arms held hovering a few inches away, and Aziraphale nearly  _ frowns,  _ before they shove their ways into the hug as well, holding their Godson close.

\---

There is a knock on a door.

This was not an irregular occurrence, even when a sign that told the visitor that their destination was  _ closed  _ was up. Some humans refused to be deterred -- and while Aziraphale did take solace in the idea that not all of humanity had shed their hands of books yet -- he did not like visitors, during open  _ or  _ closed hours. So, he ignored the knocking, as polite and normal as it was. Nothing was amiss about the day, anyways. 

Crowley was curled up on the couch and sleeping, his knees to his chest and an arm slung over his face, curled into the corner so that his face was to the cushions and all Aziraphale could see of his skin was his neck and the very end of his spine, where his ever-perfect shirt had slid up his back. Harry was upstairs, asleep in his room, after having spent an entire day talking to a witch, a witch hunter, a hellhound, and The Them. An air of contentedness had flooded the bookstore sometime around noon, as Aziraphale read his text, fingers twisting into the pages every few minutes to continue onward, smiling at the story. 

Then, a knock clips into the glass door again, and Aziraphale is shocked out of his reading for a second time. 

With all the annoyance of a painter interrupted from their magnum opus, Aziraphale stands, setting his book on the coffee table in front of him. It had never actually seen a cup of coffee -- only many wine bottles and a few hot chocolates. 

“I’m coming,” he grumbles, mostly to himself as his interruption begins their knocking for the third time, rhythmic and jerky. “Oh, Heavens.”

As he opens the door and comes face to face with Minerva Mcgonogal, he feels as if an  _ oh, fuck,  _ may have been more fitting.

“I-” She swallows, looking surprised, as if Aziraphale’s bookshop, labeled as his own, should not have belonged to him. “Zira?”

He huffs. “Yes? Minerva, it  _ is  _ twelve at night, did you not see the closed sign?”

She shakes herself off and nods, seeming to regain her composure, even if it was a shaky one. “May I come in?”

“Can this wait till-”

“It’s about Potter.”

This quiets Aziraphale, and a bit of the universe around him as well. 

“Ah.” He nods. “I think you’d better, then.”

The door opens fully, and she steps within, eyes sweeping about the room, catlike, not dissimilar from Crowley’s snake pupils. She’s dressed in dark, familiar robes as if she’d been awake and searching for something for quite some time. 

“I think you’d better sit,” she says, not instructing. She knew better -- this place was not just a place. It sang with the tune of the man-Angel-person before her and told her that she’d better not order him about. 

“Ah.” He leads her into the back room, Crowley still silently sleeping, curled around himself protectively. Aziraphale leans over and cards a finger through the Demon’s hair, smiling fondly and ignoring Minerva as she watches. “Crowley, dear?”

“Hgrk.”

A moment later, a flaming head of red hair pops off the couch, mussed and messy. Bleary yellow eyes stare at Minerva, for a second, before they narrow in mistrust and embarrassment. Though she’d never felt wary around them before, the two do seem oddly threatening, as she sits in a seat, watching as they share twin glances and prod her to start. 

“Sssso. What issss it you want?’

She nods, pressing a hand to her forehead for a moment, going over the events of her day. It had been a long one.

“When Harry did not arrive at home with the Dursley’s again, it caused a bit of a panic,” she explains, hoping to keep the hysterical warble in her voice concealed. Then, she scoffs. “That’s an understatement. I thought Albus was going to hex someone.”

“He is rather immature, isn’t he?”

“Nah.” Crowley shakes his head. “He’s mature, jusss’ stupid.”

She stares.

“Anyways- there was a massive race to find the boy once again, as you can understand. We assumed he may have ended up with someone far more sinister than those muggle  _ barbarians.”  _

“Oh!” Aziraphale brightens significantly. “So you didn’t like them either?”

She lets out a harsh, but brief laugh. “Absolutely not, professor. They were cruel. I had half a mind to abscond with the boy myself -- but the upsides outweighed the downsides.”

“Upsidesss. Of putting Harry with his abussive relatives.”

“No-” she huffs. “They were protection. As long as he remained with them, he would be relatively undetectable. Added protection, I suppose, seeing as there was no point in searching through a muggle’s home for the  _ Boy who lived.” _

“But, because our only idea of where he could be was the Dursley’s, naturally, we went to them first. They were quite unpleasant, but we did get one thing from them. Their “attacker,”  _ such a silly idea, really,  _ had bright yellow snake eyes.”

Crowley, who had a history of blanching, did.

“Now, that didn’t mean much to Albus, naturally. The muggles refused to say anything else, anyways. But…”

“But?” Aziraphale frowns.

“But, at the final feast in the Great hall, when you took your glasses off, Anthony, I  _ did  _ happen to see your eyes.” She waves her hand around. “They don’t seem too out of the ordinary, until you realize that there is, quite simply, no one else anywhere around here that seems to have bright yellow snake eyes. In fact, a snake animagus has not been born or registered in many years.”

“I’m not an animaguss,” he corrects, unblinkingly. “I just am.”

She nods her head, slowly, still confused but continuing regardless. “So, while Albus searched for a dead end, I came here. To ask you something.”

“I suppose you’ll be asking for Harry back, won’t you?” Aziraphale asks coolly, an icy haze in his eyes that has Minerva bristling with indignance. Still, she knows its more than a little deserved.

“Oh, Heavens no,” she argues back. “In fact-- I’m here to thank you.”

The two in front of her share another wordless look, confusion filtering between them, before they look back to her and wait for an explanation.

“I… Have quite a few regrets, from my life. One of them was leaving Potter with his relatives.” She sighs. “I’d protested it, at first. My worries only came back when he arrived at school, and I had to remember that he’d be forced to go home with his horrible aunt and uncle. Then, I realized, that for some reason, he was more like his father than I could’ve expected.”

“We took him in the day after he went shopping at Diagon Alley,” Aziraphale murmurs, smiling fondly. “I slapped Dursley.”

“And you’re absolutely bloody right for it,” Crowley says, grinning. “I hope he believed my threat.”

“So,” Minerva continues once again, smiling warmly at them. “I have come here to thank you. I had half a mind to steal him away this summer if things continued. But, I see that he is in good hands.”

The two smile back, softening at her, warm, and somehow -- despite their relatively youthful facades -- they both look ages beyond their years.

“You can tell Albus,” Crowley says. “S not like he can take Harry back.”

Aziraphale snorts. “I’d like to see him try.”

“You’re going to allow him to know?” Minerva twists her hands together. “You aren’t worried at all, that he’ll try and take the boy back?”

“Bah.” Crowley waves a flippant hand. “We’re more than enough to keep him away, anyways.”

For some reason, Minerva feels inclined to believe him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all so, so much for reading this, and coming along to be so supportive to me! I cannot thank any of you enough. Truly.
> 
> Anyways! The next book will begin eventually. I'll post one last chapter on here -- an announcement -- once I've dropped it. 
> 
> Till next time!


	10. Sequel announcement

Hello and welcome back to "Wizard's Omens!" I apologize for being so absent in answering comments recently, but I have FINALLY posted the first chapter of the second book in this series! 

I hope that everyone enjoys it. Have fun!

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks so much for reading, I really hope you enjoyed! Feel free to leave kudos, comments, critiques, compliments, anything you want. Your support is f o o d.


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